Animorphs: The Untold Stories 1 The Revenge
by HephaestusBuilds
Summary: My AU story in which David returns with the help of Crayak. David captures the Animorphs and forces Jake to decide who among them will die by his hand. WARNING: Includes alcohol/substance abuse, withdrawal, depression, suicide, PTSD, murder, and sexual actions at the end of the story. Has a graphic last few chapters. My first Fan Fic so please R&R. Completed. Untold Stories: #1
1. Chapter 1: Jake: The Wolf

Animorphs: The Untold Stories#1 The Revenge

By: HephaestusBuilds

(Author's Note)

I do not own the Animorphs, or anything for that matter.

My AU story in which David returns with the help of Crayak to kill the Animorphs.

David returns with in human form with his ability to morph, he manages to easily capture the Animorphs and tells Jake that he must make a decision, one of the Animorphs must die by his hand.

While this story includes all the Animorphs and some other characters it is featured around Jake.

Genre: Sci Fi, Action, Adventure, Romance, Depression/Hurt/Comfort

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Chapter 1 Jake: The Wolf

You know there are just some things that you don't want to see when you first get home after school. Things like seeing your parents waiting for you at the front door, seeing a police car outside your home, even seeing your house burst into flames when you walk up the front steps. But nothing, not even seeing your house light on fire compares to walking through the front door and finding your parents sitting at the dining table talking to... your vice principal. This particular vice principal's name was, Mr. Chapman. Him being a normal vice principal would be bad enough, but, unfortunately, as we all know, he isn't a normal vice principal. He's a controller. If he knew my true identity, he would kill me without a second thought, or worse, make me into a controller. Make me turn against my friends, slowly capturing them all and turning them into controllers as well.

Oh shit, that got my mind racing, what if he knew, knew about me and my friends, knew that we, and we alone were the cause of all his problems? If he did then I was beaten, if he knew, then he had me surrounded, even if I couldn't see them, I knew there were dozens of Hork-Bajir waiting for me. Where, I thought. Where could they be? I didn't see any loading or semi trucks big enough to hold them on the street. Maybe they were further in the house, waiting, waiting to grab me and drag me down into the Yeerk Pool. Was _He_ here? Waiting to grab me? Possibly kill me? I know that I'm valuable to Him, but maybe I'm more trouble than I'm worth? Hopefully, for my sake, I am.

I couldn't do anything, nothing. So I just stood there, looking at them, trying not to look like a nervous wreck, which I was.

"Jake?" My mother said, sweetly. "why don't you sit down?" I sat.

"Hello Jake, nice of you to join us. I was just going to talk to your parents about your strange behaviours lately." Mr. Chapman said, sounding just like the normal principal he was supposed to be.

"Strange behaviours?" My Dad asked, skeptically. "Like what?"

"Things like showing up to school half asleep." Mr. Chapman replied. "He has been missing classes, showing up late. According to his teachers he hasn't been turning in homework for the past several weeks."

My parents just looked from Mr. Chapman to me, my Dad had a disappointed look on his face.

"Now," Mr. Chapman continued. "This is a very common thing, this happens all the time this time of year. The school year is almost over so kids start to slack off on their school work. He's almost a senior, so this is very common. But I don't want this to happen to a nice kid like you, Jake, you always got your work done, you showed up to school on time everyday, wanting to learn. What has happened?"

Now, you have to understand that I didn't see this coming, he sounded actually concerned with my grades. I half expected him to break the news to my parents while he dragged them and me down to the Yeerk pool laughing maniacally as he did it. So I didn't know what to say.

"Jake," my mother said, looking right at me. "Answer Mr. Chapman, what's been going on?"

"Uh, I don't know, uh..." I rambled, trying to come up with a good lie.

"Jake," My father said. "That's not an answer, tell us, tell us what is happening."

Now, I was about to answer him when my dog, Homer, started barking like mad.

"Rrrooowww! Rrroow! Row! ROW!" "What is he going on about now?" My Dad said, standing up.

"What's that?" Mr. Chapman asked, questioningly.

"It's just our dog Homer, he's just outside. He probably just found a squirrel in the yard again." My Mom answered.

Then, from the backyard came a sound that made my teeth rattle.

"RRRrrrrrooooorrrwww!"

"What was that?! Was that Homer?" My Mom asked.

"That couldn't be Hommer, that sounded like a coyote or something!" My Dad yelled. Just then, from the backyard came the sound of a fight, biting and clawing and finally came the sound of Homer, whimpering, as if he was hurt. I didn't waste any time, I rushed to the sliding glass door the connected to the back deck and threw it open. And I just stood there, awestruck, you wouldn't believe what I was seeing, I was seeing my dog, Homer, in an all out brawl with a wolf. As I was watching, the wolf smacked Homer on the side of his head him it's paw, knocking him to the ground.

"Homer!" I yelled, as I started to run up to him. The wolf snarled at me then it lunged at me.

"Jake!" My father yelled as he grabbed me by the arm and pulled me back into the house, kicking the wolf in the face. "Watch out, that wolf will kill you."

By this time Homer picked himself up and attacked the wolf, Homer was going for it's eyes and face. Homer was fighting back with so much veracity, Homer looked like a well trained attack dog. It kind of shocked me, I've never seen Homer so violent before. He had always been a very mild mannered and goofy dog. But I guess that inside every mild mannered dog is a wild animal.


	2. Chapter 2: Jake: The Yeerk's Tear

Chapter 2 Jake: The Yeerk's Tear

I didn't know what to do, I couldn't do anything. Nothing. I can't tell you how much I wanted to morph right then and there to take that wolf down myself. To morph tiger and use my powerful canines to rip it apart, piece by piece. But I couldn't morph, not right now, not right in front of my parents, and especially not in front of Mr. Chapman. That would be the end of everything.

At this moment Homer had the upper hand, he was on top of the wolf's back, clawing at it. But to no effect, since he didn't have any long nails. But inside I knew that Homer wouldn't be in the lead for much longer, Homer is a big, strong, powerful dog, but their is no way that he could beat a full grown male wolf that hunted and fought to live.

During this time, my mom was frantically calling the police, but she was talking so fast that the operator on the other side had to keep asking her to repeat herself. My father was holding me back so wouldn't run to Homer's side. And Mr. Chapman was just standing there, looking really concerned.

Just then, something happened that made all of us gasp and stare, even Mr. Chapman.

The wolf flipped over and powerfully chomped down on Homer's neck and violently shook its head back and forth vigorously. Homer dropped to the ground like a rock, you could see his back, all torn up and bloody, his face was a mess. But what looked the worse was his neck, blood oozed out of the gaping hole that used to be his neck.

The wolf stood over Homer, looking triumphant. As if he just conquered a great foe. Strange, I thought, why would the wolf look so happy? It knew it just won, but it looked too happy. And the weird thing is that it, the wolf, just kept looking at me, staring, and making this kind of weird laughing sound, kind of like a hyena.

And as quickly as the wolf appeared, it disappeared as it hoped the back gate and ran like mad down the street. I ran to Homer, he was a mess, all beaten and bloody. I knelt down besides him, held him with all my strength, not wanting to let him go, not even when the police showed up with paramedics. My dad had to pull me away so they could work on him. Within minutes, the vets from the animal hospital showed up and started working on my Homer.

While the vets were working, the police and animal control were talking with my dad, trying to get the story. My mom and I were sitting at the couch, she was comforting me, trying to make sure I was alright. While we were sitting on the couch, Mr. Chapman came over, and he did something that I didn't expect, he said he was sorry for what had happened and if their was anything he could do, to ask. That moment shocked me, I could hear the sorrow in his voice, as if he was actually sorry for what happened. At first I thought he was just really good at playing his role, when, I saw a single tear drop from his eye. I never thought Yeerks could cry.

After a while, all of the people left, Homer with the vet, taking him to the animal hospital.

My parents didn't talk to me about what had happened or about what Chapman had said, they just let me go to my room.

Later that night I was in my room, playing Doom and crushing my old high score when Rachel called. Rachel is my cousin. I answered and all of a sudden she started yelling into the phone. She sounded frantic, she sounded scared. Which is strange because Rachel is not an emotional person. And when she is scared, something is wrong. When she finally calmed down enough for me to talk I asked her if she was alright.

"Of course I'm not alright!" She shouted. "I was just attacked!"

"What?" I asked, my mind racing. Thinking that she meant that she was attacked by the Yeerks. "What happened? Are you okay?"


	3. Chapter 3: Rachel: The Bear

Chapter 3 Rachel: The Bear

"I'm fine, now." I said coldly.

"Who attacked you?" He asked frantically.

"Not a who, it was a what." I replied a little more calmly.

"What do you mean, did Visser Three attack you, or were you attacked by a Hork-Bajir?" Jake asked me, with voice rushed.

"No, it wasn't the Yeerks. I was attacked by mountain lion."

"What? Tell me what happened?" He asked.

"I was at home," I told him "My mom and sisters were gone at a school thing for Sarah, I was in the kitchen making some dinner, singing with the radio, minding my own business, when it broke through the sliding glass door to the backyard. It just stood there, looking at me. Then it lunged, right at me. I spun around, and ran into the hallway. It grabbed me by my legs and slammed me to the ground."

"Then what happened?" He asked, "How did you get away from a mountain lion?"

"Well, when it had me on the ground, my mind went blank, I didn't know what to do, then it just hit me. I just needed to become stronger than the mountain lion. So I morphed grizzly bear."

"You did what?" He asked. "What happened?"

"You should have seen the look on the mountain lions' face," I laughed. "It was terrified. But when I started started morphing it didn't back away, it just kept attacking me.

When I was almost all of the way morphed, I grabbed it by the stomach, picked it up with pure grizzly bear might and slammed it into the counter, cracking it under it's weight. It tried to get back up but..."

"But what?" He asked.

"Well, I kind of lost it at that point, I kept just slamming it into the counter over and over... then I bit it."

"You bit it?" He asked, shocked. "You did what?"

"Hey, it was the bear, not me. But after that it just layed there for a while, not moving, until I guess it threw in the towel, because it got up and dragged itself out the way it came."

"What happened after that?" He asked.

"Well after that I demorphed, caught my breath and laid on the couch. But I didn't get to rest much because the whole neighborhood heard the lion." I said.

"My neighbor came over to my house, pounding on the door and screaming blood murder."

"Well what did you do? What did you tell them?" He asked.

"I did the only thing that I could do, I told her what happened, I left out the part of me morphing, of course. Then a few minutes later the cops were called, along with animal control." I told him.

"Rachel, something happened to Homer." He said, with sadness in his voice.

"What? What happened?" I asked.

He told me.

"Wow," I said. "I'm really sorry, Jake."

"Is Homer okay?" I asked.

"I don't know, Rachel, he's at the animal hospital."

"Oh, wait, sorry, I got to go Jake, my mom just got home, and she doesn't know what happened yet. This is going to be a very interesting conversation. See you later."

"Yeah, see you tomorrow." He replied.

"Tomorrow?" I asked, confused, not knowing what he was talking about.

"Yeah, remember, we are going to the mall with _Philip_ tomorrow to have a day off and have some fun."

"Oh, yeah, see you later." I said as I hung up the phone. I remembered who _Philip_ was.


	4. Chapter 4: Ax: The Kite

Chapter 4: Ax: The Kite

Even though I am not from this planet, there are several things that I enjoy doing here. I have really grown fond of kite making. It has proved to be a relaxing and enjoying task.

This night I was working on a new kite, just getting the basic skeleton constructed and built, it would take a few days to finish.

But I could not concentrate very well, my mind was, elsewhere. I was excited about tomorrow, tomorrow we, my human friends and I are going to the _Mall._ A mall is a very large store, where humans spend a lot of their time. Such as Rachel. We were going to the mall to get me what I have been dreaming of for weeks now. I was going to pick out my very own kite. But the best part was the I could put it together. I was overjoyed with the thought of my very own professionally designed kite. There is another reason why I enjoy going to the mall, the mall has the greatest thing on this Earth and any other, the Cinnabon. Oh, I could not wait a moment more.

Just at that moment when I was thinking about Cinnabon, Tobias landed noiselessly in the tree next to me.

[Hello, Tobias, have you been out flying?] I asked.

[Just catching some dinner.] He said. [How are you doing, you know, with going to the mall tomorrow?]

[I am really excited. But I am also worried that I may become so excited with the thought of getting a new kite that I will behave badly and Prince Jake may forbid me to go.]

I have a real hard time behaving at the mall, especially around human food.

[Yeah,] Tobias said with a brief laugh. [You aren't always the shining example of good behavior at the mall. But tomorrow is a day to relax, you know, to take a break from this whole saving the world thing.]

[Yes, tomorrow is a day for fun, that is why I suggested to Prince Jake that we go to the _beach_ , after the mall, of course.]

[I don't know about that,] He said. [But we'll see.]

[If you would please excuse me, Tobias, but I must perform the evening ritual.] I said as I started to walk away.

[Wait.] Tobias said, as he flew down from the tree. [May I come too? Just give me a moment to morph.]

[Of course, you are always welcome to accompany me, as I do the daily rituals.]

I always enjoyed Tobias doing the rituals with me, even though his Andalite body is just a genetic copy of mine, it makes me feel more at home being with him.


	5. Chapter 5: Tobias: The Race

Chapter 5 Tobias: The Race

[You know Ax, the evening ritual is my favorite.] I said.

It was about an hour after we performed the ritual. After that we went running around the forest, it was sort of a race, dodging through the trees and jumping small bushes, even though Ax didn't say anything, I knew it was. I could tell that whenever I ran up besides him, he would increase his speed.

[Yes, I also do enjoy the evening ritual. I also enjoy running with you, Tobias.]

We were slowly heading back to Ax's _scoop_ , his little home away from home. I didn't want to stop running with Ax, but I had to. For one thing I had to demorph soon. I don't know what it is, but I always love being in Andalite form. And the second and greater reason why I had to leave is because I was going over to Rachel's house. Actually I was supposed to be there half an hour ago. I just lost track of time running with Ax. Oh great, Rachel is going to kill me when I show up late without a good excuse. A really good excuse.

[Tobias,] Ax asked me. [Why must you leave to go be with Rachel? I was planning to show you some tail fighting techniques.]

[I know Ax, but Rachel just planned it, you know how it's been. Rachel and I haven't been on good grounds lately. She has been really moody lately, she always seems angry at me.]

Ax had this confused look on this face, or at least it looked like confusion. It's hard to tell his emotions sometimes. Considering Andalites are about the least emotional species I've ever met. I don't know why I was telling him this.

[Well, then I will see you tonight then,] Ax said. [You have what you humans call a good time.] And with that I was off.


	6. Chapter 6: Cassie: The Argument

Chapter 6 Cassie: The Argument

I was at home when Jake called, actually I was in my barn, tending to a poor badger that got attacked by a coyote. It is strange, we have had a lot of injured animals lately. I mean we always have injured animals but almost all of them seemed to have been attacked by another animal, not hit by cars or poisoned by farmers like usual.

"Cassie," my mother called from the porch. "You have a phone call, it's Jake." She said 'Jake' in sweet voice, putting emphasis on his name. She's always embarrassed me and teased me about him since I was little, and now that we've been officially a thing for a few years now she won't let me hear the end of it. She's even started to call him one of her kids, even implying that he and I will get married as soon as we turn eighteen. She even joked with my dad and I saying that she approved of Jake and my dad said that Jake didn't even have to ask his permission to marry me, he just had to let him know so they could plan the wedding. I swear that my parents are going to drive me crazy.

"Thanks." I said calling back. Weird, Jake doesn't normally call this late, unless something is wrong.

I walked over to the house, went in the door to grab the phone from my mom. As soon as I held the phone, she walked out of the room. That's actually good, even though we talk in a sort of code so people don't overhear our conversations, it's good not to have people around.

"Hello?" I asked into the phone.

"Hey Cassie," Jake said, his voice was filled with sorrow and sadness. "I need to tell you something."

"What?" I asked a little leery.

"Homer was attacked by a wolf this afternoon." He said this with almost no emotion whatsoever, he was almost stoic. He must have been so upset that he was keeping it inside.

"What happened, Jake, tell me."

He told me.

"It's going to be okay, Jake." I told him reassuringly.

"No!" He yelled, with an awful harshness in his voice. "It's not going to be okay. Homer could die, do you not understand that? How is that okay? What kind of person are you? You know, I don't know why I'm even talking to you. You have never been there for me when I've needed it the most!"

"Never been there?" I said back. "I have always been there, for you and everyone in the group. How dare you say that."

"Oh, don't all act all high and mighty with me, Cassie!" He yelled. "You know I'm telling the truth. You are a terrible person, you never want to hear the truth. You're so weak, I don't even know why I'm even with you!"

"What?" I demanded. "What do you mean by that?!"

"You know exactly what I mean!" He said. "We are over, we are done. Relationship wise and friendship wise. You are no longer my girlfriend and you are no longer welcome in the group with us! We're breaking up!"

"You can't do that." I shot back.

"I just did. I'm the leader aren't I?"

"You're no leader!" I shot back as I hung up the phone. I was never speaking to him again.

My mom noticed my frustration, and like any good mom, she came over to hold my head in her hands as I wept the night away.

"It's okay, it's just teenage drama, everything will be fine." She said. She always says that to me when something is wrong.

"The world's not over"

If only she knew, knew that it could be. Without all of us together, we don't stand a chance.


	7. Chapter 7: Marco: The Casanova

Chapter 7 Marco: The Casanova

Today is a good day, like a really, really good day, the best I've had in awhile actually, no crazy near death experiences with Rachel, no saving the world, no life threatening suicidal missions down to the Yeerk pool, I even got a girl's number this afternoon at school. It was even her actual number, I called it as soon as I could to make sure. I've had a problem with a few girls, who names must not be spoken, that have given me fake numbers when I asked for them. Can you believe that? I mean, I'm totally irresistable, I'm the complete package, I'm like a combination of George Michael and Fabio, how could any girl resist this face? Anyway, what was I saying? Oh yeah. Perfect, this day was entirely perfect, until I got home that is.

I was heading home after dinner was supposed to start, but I wasn't too late, my dad probably wouldn't mind, as long as I had an excuse for being a little late. If he was even home, with all the new projects at his office, he barely had a moment to rest.

We were going to spend the night playing video games, watching movies and eating a totally unhealthy amount of pizza and soda. Like passing out from an overdose of greasy cheese and sugary soda amount of food. And do you know the best part of this night is? The best part is that it's just us, no Mrs. Robbinette here tonight. She was away with family. Something about a great uncle who was killed by one of those weird vending machines in Japan or something. You know the ones I'm talking about? The ones that sell shoes, soup, car tires and used women's underwear and virtually anything else you could think of. Anyway, she's out of town for a week or so. It's not that I don't like her, it's just that it's good to have some time with just my dad. And let's face it, having a math teacher for a mom is just plain wrong, like it should be illegal or something. I'm pretty sure that that is considered child abuse or something. I can never get out of doing my homework.

I was walking home while checking out this hot girl with amazing legs and an even better butt looking at herself in the mirror, through her window when I saw this kid I knew from school, who also lives in my neighborhood, he was walking towards me as fast as he could. He had this dumb, scared look on his face. Like he just saw a ghost. And I was just about to ask him that exact question when he said something that took the eternal grin off my ever so perfect face.

"Marco, your dad is hurt, he had an accident. The police are looking for you." He said with sorrowful look on his face. "I'm sorry."

"Where?" I demanded, grabbing his shoulders.

"At your house, the paramedics are taking him to the hospital now I'm sorry."

And with that, I ran full out to my house, like a bat out of hell.


	8. Chapter 8: Marco: The Robber

Chapter 8 Marco: The Rober

I arrived at my house just about when the whole neighborhood heard the news that my father was attacked. The street was covered in a dozen police cars, two fire trucks, three ambulances, a few news vans and even a garbage truck. There were people everywhere, news people, police, neighbors and random strangers. I pushed my way through them, running to my house to see my dad. I ducked under some police tape and began running to my house but was almost immediately stopped by two policemen.

"Are you Marco?" A policeman I didn't notice asked.

"Y, yes." I said shakily.

"Come with me, son." He said as he led me through the crowd surrounding my house.

"Son," the policeman said with a formal, sad, over practiced tone. "Your father was brutally attacked late this afternoon. It was a robbery gone wrong, the thief broke in through the back door, breaking the glass. Then searched through the house, knocking things over, breaking things. Your father confronted the man with a steak knife from the kitchen. Your father said he thought he had the element of surprise, but the man overpowered him."

"The man wore a mask, gloves and a large trench coat, so we have no I.D." Another policeman said. "A neighbor confronted the man as he was leaving the property, it appears that he saw the man entering the house through the back and tried to help, but he has sustained a broken arm, jaw and multiple broken ribs."

The police then had to ask me the usual police questions they ask on T.V. Do you know of anyone who would want to harm your father? Does he owe anyone money? You know, the usual police questions.

I just kept saying no, I didn't know of anybody who want to hurt him, my dad has no enemies, he's loved by everyone he knows.

"Can I please go see him now?" I asked the officer in charge of talking to me.

"Of course. He is on his way to the hospital, son. He should be on the way to the emergency room by now." And with that the policeman himself drove me to the hospital.

You know how I say that life is either comedy or tragedy? That we get the choice to be happy or to let our problems bring us down. My whole life I lived on the comedy side of that line, now, I'm gonna live on the other side. My mom, Visser One is dead, my dad is the only reason that I fight this war, without him, I have nothing.


	9. Chapter 9: Rachel: Xena's Worry

Chapter 9 Rachel: Xena's Worry

I was waiting for Tobias to come over when I heard someone at my door. Who could it be? Tobias should be here any time now, and I can't have anybody around when Tobias comes over. It would be way too hard to explain the red tailed hawk in my room. Or even how a strange blond boy in a skin tight shirt and bike shorts got in my room without going through the house and without any of my family seeing him.

"Who is it?" I asked. It had better not be Jordan, she has been really grinding my nerves lately.

"It's me." It was my mom, what could she possibly want? I went and opened the door.

"I just want to let you know that your father called, he wants to take you camping this weekend."

You see, I would love to go camping this weekend but, we are always busy. Normally I can't go because we have a mission planned. We had no mission this weekend but we were going to take Ax to the mall. So you see why I can't go camping this weekend.

"Sorry, mom, but I already had plans this weekend. I was going to go to the mall with Cassie and then the beach."

"But Rachel," My mom said. "You haven't been doing anything with your dad for awhile now. And you know how much he likes to spend time with you."

"I know mom, but I already had plans." I said, wishing that I could do both at the same time.

"Well, just think about it, you know how happy it makes him."

Why did she have to say that last part, now I felt guilty.

My mom left and I locked the door, and soon as it was locked, I heard a faint tapping on my window. It was Tobias. He was late.

I walked over to the window and let him in. He looked different, he seemed bigger than he normally is. But, I guess his hawk body was just growing, I didn't know that it could grow any more since his hawk body was an adult.

"Hey, you were supposed to get here almost two hours ago." I said with the right attitude. He has been late before but not like this.

[Sorry,] He said, sounding unlike himself. [I ran a little late with Ax.]

"Tobias, what is going on with your voice? It's all messed up."

[I don't know, Ax said it has to do with some complicated Andalite thing.] He explained. [I don't get it, honestly, I didn't understand half the words he said.]

"Why don't you morph to human so you can lay on my bed and watch some T.V. with me."

[I can't, Ax said that while this, whatever he said is going on, I can't morph very well.]

"Why's that? And when will you be able to morph again?"

[Oh, uh, he said that it should pass by tonight at midnight. That weird, since isn't it always midnight in fairy tales?]

"So, will you be able to come tomorrow?" I asked. "To the mall I mean?"

[Yeah,] He said hesitantly. [I don't know. I'll try. Hey, do you know of any missions we have planned that I don't know of?]

"No." I said, kind of confused by his question. "No, just that we are all going to the mall with Ax tomorrow to get him a kite. That's all I know of."

[Oh, I knew about that. K. I'll go.]

I layed back down on my bed and flipped through the channels to find something to watch. What Tobias said got me thinking, we always cuddled on my bed and watched T.V. when he came over, did he come up with the morphing thing as an excuse because he didn't want to lay with me on my bed. Is it because I've been hard on him lately? I doubt it, Tobias would never do that to me, if he had a problem with me he'd say it, probably.

Tobias and I just sat in silence watching a movie for an hour and a half until he said that he wasn't feeling good and that he had to go. I offered to fly back to his meadow with him as an owl but he quickly said that he'd prefer to fly by himself, and that he'd appreciate if I left him alone for awhile. He said this as he flew out my window, my jaw dropped, I couldn't believe that he had just said that. I was just about to stick my head out my window and yell at him when I heard someone walking by my door, I couldn't exactly yell at him with my mom or sisters listening, so I kept my mouth shut and silently cursed him under my breath.

Maybe I was right about Tobias being upset with me. He had showed up two hours late and refused to morph human and lay with me on my bed. We had always done that whenever he came over. I would always lay my head on his chest as we held hands. Sometimes I worry that he doesn't love me. Tobias is losing his humanity and emotions more and more everyday. As a hawk he doesn't feel joy, anger, sadness or love. Maybe he is becoming more hawk than man.

I sat in my bed for a few minutes thinking about what Tobias said to me before getting up to take a shower and go to bed.

I'll talk to him tomorrow, see what's going on with him, I thought.


	10. Chapter 10: Ax: Missing Animorphs

Chapter 10 Ax: Missing Animorphs

Oh I am so overjoyed, we are about to go to the _mall_ , to get me a new kite that I could construct myself.

We were outside the mall in the nearby woods. I was standing at the edge of the woods with my human friends besides me. But only Prince Jake, and Rachel were there. We knew that Marco was with his father, he had been severely injured by a human who I did not know, but whose name was _Arobber_. My human friends later informed me that it was _A Robber_. But I do not know who this _Robber_ is.

"So, Rachel," Prince Jake said. "When did you last see Tobias?"

"I saw him last night, he said he was coming with us to the mall today, but he seemed off."

Tobias is missing, as well as Cassie. I am beginning to worry about him, he did not return to the _scoop_ last night.

"How about you, Ax. Do you have any idea where Tobias could be?" Prince Jake asked me.

[No, Prince Jake. He did not return to the _scoop_ last night, which is strange.]

"He left last night around 9:30, he said he was going to the _scoop_ for rest." Rachel said.

"Rest? Did he seem tired?" Prince Jake asked.

"Yeah," Rachel explained. "He said something about his hawk body growing and it was making him tired. Also something about his hawk morph causing him to be sleepy and that's why his thought speak sounded off."

[His thought speak sounded off, how do you mean? Was it not functioning correctly?]

"It was working just fine," She answered. "He just sounded weird. His voice just sounded a bit deeper. And he didn't morph to human like he usually does."

"Why not?" Prince Jake asked.

"He said it had to do with the hawk body changing or something. He said he could morph when it was over, and that was supposed to be at midnight."

"What does that mean?" Prince Jake asked.

"I don't know," She answered. "If you want a better answer just ask Ax, he's the one who told Tobias about it."

Prince Jake turned his head and looked at me with a look on his face which I think means confusion.

"What does she mean, Ax?" He asked. "What is going on with Tobias?"

[I do not know what Rachel is talking about, I do not understand, I did not tell Tobias anything.]

"What happened yesterday?" Prince Jake asked.

[He performed the evening ritual with me, in Andalite form of course. Then...]

"Wait," Rachel said, interrupting me. "Tobias said that he couldn't morph yesterday while the whatever was going on."

"While what was going on?" Prince Jake asked. "Ax," He said, turning to me. "What is Rachel talking about?"

[I do not know what she is talking about, we did the evening ritual then he had to leave, to be with you, Rachel. I wanted to show him some tail fighting techniques to use in battle. But he left, saying when he got back, we could do some tail fighting.]

"Ax." Prince Jake asked. "When did Tobias leave last night?"

[He left the scoop around 6:30 in your hours.]

"But he got at my house at 7:45. So it took him more than an hour to get to my house."

Prince Jake had a look on his face that means he had make a hard decision. It's a look I see too often in battle. Sometimes I fear for Prince Jake's mental state. A War Prince, even a Prince like Prince Jake has struggles, the weight of commanding your friends in war can drive any good warrior mad. It happens all too often in hopeless situations such as this. But Prince Jake, as well as all of us know that there is an end to this war, this war has two endings, one where we will be free, and the other, unimaginable.

"Ax," Prince Jake said. "Looks like we are going to have to skip the mall today. With Tobias missing and Cassie not returning my calls, we can't afford to do this today. We need to go find Tobias."


	11. Chapter 11: Jake: The Vulture

Chapter 11 Jake: The Vulture

[Rachel, you go look around town by the mall and up to the Gardens. Ax, you go search the woods, check the scoop and Tobias' normal hunting grounds.]

[Okay,] Rachel asked. [What are you going to do?]

[I'm going to go check on Cassie, see why she won't return my calls. And why her mom yelled at me over the phone, then hung up before I could say a word.]

We were all in our birds of prey morphs. Circling the mall parking lot. Trying to stay close enough to hear each other and far enough to not look like a raptor display.

[So, anyway, lets go, lets go find Tobias.] With that we all took off in different directions. Off, to go find Tobias, hopefully it's not too late. Tobias, the greatest casualty in this war. My fault, my fault his life was ruined. And I'm not letting him get hurt because of me again. With that I flew off towards Cassie's house.

It took me only a few minutes to get to Cassie's house. I landed in a tree next to the barn. Aka the Wildlife Rehabilitation Clinic. I was looking for Cassie when I suddenly found her, not in the barn but in the woods about fifty yards to the left. She was wearing a horse blanket, covering up her body, which is strange, because we all, even Ax, can morph clothing. I don't know, maybe she had clothing on under the blanket. But the weird thing was that she was walking away from the barn, deeper into the woods. She threw off the blanket, revealing her morphing suit, which was not her usual leotard, she was wearing . From this she started to morph, it wasn't the osprey, it took me awhile to figure out that it was a vulture of some kind. Strange, I didn't know she had that morph.

She started to fly off towards the mountains. I started to follow. I was about to call to her in thought speech when I decided that whatever she was doing behind our backs, we needed to know.


	12. Chapter 12: Rachel: The Lion

Chapter 12 Rachel: The Lion

I was flying around town for awhile looking for Tobias when I decided to head back towards the mall. I was supposed to be looking for Tobias, but according to Jake Cassie is also missing. And what kind of teenager doesn't go to the mall during a huge sale, Cassie, I thought, that's who. Also, I didn't want to admit it but there is this huge sale at the Gap that starts today. All items are half off. So I decided to head to the mall to check out the sale. I couldn't go in of course, I mean it'd be kinda odd if a bald eagle just walked into the Gap and started looking at shoes, but I could at least look in through the windows and the skylight.

See, bald eagles hunt for fish, and that means they can see through water, and seeing through glass is a lot like seeing through water.

So I'm flying over the mall, looking through the skylight, trying to see if there were any other sales when I glanced by one of those electronic signs that tells the time and temperature. You know what I mean, the ones you see by banks. When I saw the time I cursed to myself, I had fifteen minutes left in morph. So I decided to land of the roof and demorph. I've done it many times, the roof is so high that you can't be seen from the parking lot, plus, there are a bunch of giant air conditioners on the roof you can hide behind.

I landed and started to demorph, I scared some poor pigeon on the roof, apparently it missed me land but saw me demorph. It flew off like it was drunk, all frantic and off balanced. Ha, I laughed to myself, stupid pigeon.

When I was fully demorphed I sat for a minute, morphing is always tiring. So I decided to catch my breath. I was thinking about the sale at the Gap when it hit me, I didn't have to just sit up here thinking about the sale, I could just go in the mall and check it out. I remembered that I had stuffed some clothes up here in an old broken cabinet that the maintenance crew used to use. I peeked around the giant air conditioner, nope, nobody was up here.

I walked over to the cabinet, slipped my street clothes over my morphing suit and headed to the maintenance door that connected to the top floor.

I peeked out the door, making sure nobody saw me. Then headed to the nearest crowd walking by. I was safe, nobody saw me. It was Saturday morning, everybody who was anybody was at the mall today. With all the sales going on you would have to be crazy not to show up. I turned the corner passing some old mall cop on a segway that was eating a corndog and I headed to the Gap.

I arrived at the Gap when the sale was in full swing, every single square inch of floor space was taken up by a body searching for a great deal. I was by the tees when I heard something that at first I thought I imagined. Until I heard it again, it was someone, wrong, not just one person but a whole group of people yelling. At first I thought it was just an argument, it has happened before, during sales, people can get a little crazy. But it was what they were yelling that got me. I swear I heard someone yell _lion_. I couldn't tell for sure so I walked out of the store careful to put the shirt I was holding down. I was at the door where I could see the madness. People were yelling, screaming, running past me, bumping into me when I heard what sent all these people fleeing for their lives.

"Oh my..." The voice yelled. "That's a lion."

I was dumbfounded, how could a lion be in the mall? Actually, it has happened before, when David attacked Jake. But David was gone, so it couldn't be him.

I ran, like a fish swimming upstream, going against the crowd, trying to see this lion. I knew that it was stupid, that it was crazy. Something Marco would call insane. But that's why he calls me Xena: Warrior Princess. I live off crazy.

I turned the corner to the food court when I saw it. It was not an African Lion, the one with the mane, like I thought. It was a mountain lion. 160 pounds of muscle, nine feet long with a sprinter's body and a killer's instinct. With large, powerful canines designed for tearing into your neck removing head from shoulders. It was thirtyfive feet away. It stared at me with those fierce, intelligent eyes. It lowered itself to a running stance when I heard a roar, but the lion's mouth was closed. Then from a nearby restaurant another lion joined its brother.

I was shocked, two lions in one mall. I didn't think they lived in a group.

The lions looked ready to run at me when they suddenly stopped, they just turned their heads and ran out the door. They actually went through the glass door.

The mall stood silent until the police showed up, talking to witnesses and getting everybody out of the mall. I slipped away when nobody was looking and headed towards the woods to morph.


	13. Chapter 13: Jake: The Reunion

Chapter 13 Jake: The Reunion

I was following Cassie into the woods by air, I was also looking for Tobias as well. I figured that he wouldn't be all the way out here but Cassie was still headed the same direction, still heading deeper into the woods.

I was looking forwards, my keen, powerful, hawk eyes looking at Cassie. When the peregrine in me sensed a bird above me. Suddenly I saw a figure to my right, then a figure to my left. An eagle of some kind to my right and a condor to my left. Both were several times my size. When I was suddenly attacked from above. My back was being shredded, torn apart, by an unknown bird above me. Then the back of my neck was being torn by the birds powerful beak. I was being forcibly brought to the ground. The bird on my back was driving me to the ground. Trying to have me crash into the ground, to disable me or to kill me, which one I didn't know. Until it suddenly let me go, I couldn't flap, I tried but my wings were trashed.

I hit the ground at a good twenty miles per hour. Slamming into the ground knocked the wind out of me. My head was suddenly grabbed from above. Upon impact I could feel several of my fragile bird bones shatter.

[Aaahhhh!] I screamed in pain. My eyes were being stabbed by large talons, being ripped out of their sockets. Then I could feel my legs being cut and clawed at by the two other birds. Then it hit me, they took out my eyes and now they were taking out my legs. My wings were already useless, they had me beat, there was no I'd be able to escape in my current form.

But who were they? Who in the world was attacking me? I knew that it wasn't a group of real birds that were attacking me, there was no way that three different kind of birds would work together to drive me to the ground. Was it Visser Three or the Yeerks? Had they somehow figured out how to infest birds as well?

The pain was unbearable, I had to demorph, to get rid of the pain and to see who and what was attacking me.

I started to demorph as fast as possible, with the birds trying to remove my legs. As soon as they noticed me demorphing they started to let me go until my birds sense of smell smelled something, something I didn't understand. It smelled like a human, but strange. And the weird thing was that I recognized this human. Someone I would never forget, but someone I thought I would never see again.

"Hello, Jake." David said. "Long time no see, why don't you demorph to human? So we can have a nice little chat."


	14. Chapter 14: Cassie

Chapter 14 Cassie:

"I don't know, I just don't know." I told my mom. She was talking to me about what Jake did last night. He made no sense, what he was talking about made no sense to me at all. What did he mean about me never being there for him?

"Do you think that he was just stressed and just lost it for a moment?" My mom asked me.

If only she knew, our relationship is not just at risk but the whole team is in danger.

"I don't know," I told her. "I was thinking that I would call him and talk to him about it."

"Don't just call him," She said. "You need to talk to him face to face. Why don't I drive you down to his house in awhile so you can talk to him? Just remember to be calm, that's the secret to all arguments. You don't want to lose your cool as well, that would just make it worse."

"Okay, I'll do that. We can go after I finish fixing my work boot. I don't know how these things break so easily."

Later that day my mom drove me to Jake's house. I was nervous the whole way there. I didn't know what to say. I still had no idea of what he meant by me not ever being there. Maybe my mom was right, maybe he got stressed out, called me to feel better, then ended up losing it. But what she doesn't know is that Jake has more stress than anyone his age. Jake is fighting a war. But he is also the one leading that war. Jake makes life and death choices everyday. And several times a mission.

Maybe he was just stressed. He's probably gotten over it by now.

My mom parked the car at Jake's house, wished me luck as I got out of the car and drove off. I started walking to the door before I knew what was happening. I didn't know what to do. I didn't know what to say.

I walked up the front steps, stopped at the door. Gathered my thoughts and knocked on the door. His brother Tom answered.

"Hey, Cassie." He said. "Jake's not here right now. He left and said something about heading to Taco Bell with Marco to help him get his mind off of his dad. Oh, you heard about Marco's dad right?"

"Yeah I did, we were planning to go see him tomorrow." I answered.

"Oh, okay." He said with a fake sad tone in his voice. "So he'll probably be out until midnight like always since our parents are going out of town in a few hours and since I'm going on a camping trip with The Sharing. So I have no idea when he'll be back, if he comes back at all. It's not my job to look after the midget, he's seventeen, he can do whatever he wants as far as I'm concerned."

"Okay," I muttered. "Thanks, see you later."

He closed the door as I turned and walked away. I always felt a little weary around Tom. He's a controller, and if he ever found out where Jake went every day and what he did, we would all be dead.

Well, I thought to myself, now to find Jake. I decided to head to Taco Bell for lunch on the off chance that Jake was actually there. Hopefully Marco wasn't with him so we could talk in private.

So I turned the corner and hopped the bus and headed to Taco Bell.


	15. Chapter 15: Cassie: Jake's Question

Chapter 15 Cassie: Jake's Question

I was walking to the door of Taco Bell when I saw Jake through the window. It was now or never. I had to talk to him, to clear my head.

I walked in the door and headed over to the table Jake was at.

"Hey, Jake." I said, nervous beyond belief.

"Hey, Cassie." He said, way too friendly. "What's up?"

"I, uh, just wanted to talk to you."

"About what? He asked, kind of confused.

"About our argument last night." I was shocked, had he forgotten already?

He was looking at me, kinda strangely. Like he was trying to figure out what I was talking about.

"Oh," He said, looking like a lightbulb went off in his head "I remember now. So?"

"So I wanted to talk to you about it. To figure what you were talking about. To see what I can do to help you."

"Oh," He said, "What about it? I'm fine, are you fine?"

"Am I fine?!" I yelled, a little too loudly. Now everyone was looking at me, great, I didn't want people listening to our conversation.

He spent five minutes yesterday yelling at me, and now he's acting like it's no big deal. What's up with him.

"Hey." He said, "I'm fine, I'm cooled off. I was just upset. I really didn't mean to blow up in your face. I'm ready to forgive and forget, If you are, I mean. You know that I would never mean to hurt you, you know that right?"

I was still shocked at how calm he was, he was just sitting there, eating a soft taco waiting for my answer. He didn't seem right to me. Maybe he wasn't actually okay with it. Maybe he was still mad, just pretending to be happy so it doesn't mess up the group.

Uh oh, I thought, had he told Marco? Because Marco can't keep his mouth shut to save his life. Hopefully he didn't tell anybody else in the group.

"Cassie?" He asked me, looking deep into my eyes. "Are you okay? Are you still mad? Because if you still are then,..." He paused for a second and reached over and took my hand, "Then I have an idea how I can make it up to you." He said with a grin on his face and a certain look in his eye.

"What do you mean by that?" I asked, shocked and hoping that he wasn't talking about what I thought he was talking about.

"I mean that my parents are going to be out of town for the weekend and Tom is going to a Sharing thing at the same time so I'll have the house to myself for the weekend if you wanna come over and _talk_ about it." He said talk in such a way that I knew what he meant, I couldn't believe him, he yelled at me last night saying that he was breaking up with me and now he's inviting me over tonight when his parents and brother will be out of town to… to do what teenagers do when parents aren't around at night.

"Are you seriously asking me that Jake? Now of all times? I thought that we both agreed that we wouldn't, you know,... do that until we graduated and when this war was over. And didn't you have to have a conversation with Rachel and Tobias about this same exact thing when her family was out of town a while ago? Wouldn't that be hypocritical?"

"Well, what they don't know won't hurt them." He said with a smile. "And honestly," He continued, "I'm really wanting to take this relationship of ours up a notch or two. I also don't wanna die before I get a chance to wake up with you in my arms. Now, don't tell the others, but I truly think that we won't make it for much longer, too many close calls recently, we're out of luck. I just want one night Cassie, just one." He said softly as he squeezed my hand harder. "And if you don't wanna do more than what we've already done then I can't force you, but please, just come over tonight. I want to be with you just once."

"I don't know, Jake, I just don't feel comfortable with that right now."

What should I do? On one hand he yelled at me just yesterday and called us off and I don't know what to do about that. But on the other hand I have to admit that it was a tempting offer. Jake and I have never done anything more than kiss, hug and cuddle on the couch, but nothing like he was suggesting. Jake was always a gentleman about that kind of stuff, he'd never ask or expect me to do it if I didn't want to. But honestly while we made the decision to wait until we got married or at least until we graduated because we were both already seventeen, to sleep together I couldn't think of a single reason to say no to him, I've been really wanting to lately for some reason.


	16. Chapter 16: Jake

Chapter 16 Jake:

I woke up, my mind groggy. I couldn't think right. What had happened? I was following Cassie, then...

"Oh no, David." I said, remembering what happened. But not believing it.

"What's wrong, Jake? Not happy to see me?" He mocked, it _was_ David.

I looked around, trying to move. But I couldn't, I was chained to a wooden pillar.

But I didn't know where I was. It looked like some kind of old building, like a small factory.

Wait, I didn't notice it before, but there were other people in here. But none I recognized. There were seven pillars in the room, I was chained to one. The rest were empty, except for one across from me. It was hard to tell what it was. It was some kind of bird. I recognized the bird. Then it hit me, it was Tobias!

I didn't recognize him. He was all beaten and broken. His right wing was gone, nothing but bone, blood and skin. His left wing was sliced and cut to the bone. Almost all of his feathers were gone.

I didn't want to think about it, but Tobias wasn't moving. Either he was unconscious or,... I didn't want to think about it. If he was, then David was going down by either me or Rachel.

"Hello, Jake. How are you? Can I get you something to eat, maybe to drink?"

He was smug. He knew he had me. Even if I could get past him, I could see eight other people. Ranging from a little younger than me to a few in their twenties. But these people weren't chained like me. They were standing, sitting or leaning around. Some had knives, another had a baseball bat. Two were standing by Tobias, where he was in a cage. Three were watching me. Two in front of the door. And another standing by David. Even if I could get out of these chains, I couldn't get past all those people. Not as myself, but as tiger I could take them out and escape in less than three minutes. But David was here. He knew that I would be helpless in mid-morph. I was stuck, I couldn't do anything.

"What do you want, David?" I asked, looking around the room, trying to find a way to escape.

"What? No small talk? No how are you David, or long time no see, David?" He said with a smirk on his face and a sound of disgust in his voice.

"Where am I? What is this place?"

"Now now, Jake. Jake, the fearless leader of the Animorphs. Jake the champion of the Ellimist, the destroyer of the yeerk pool and conqueror of the Crayak. What, no witty remarks or threats on my life for killing a member of your little band of Animorphs."

What? Was this true, or was he trying to just send my mind into panic, but Tobias has here and he looks dead, Did David really kill him?

"Speechless?" He asked with a smirk. "I can't imagine why. Oh, did your stupid little brain finally realize that I have you beat? Have you finally realized that that pathetic creature over there is actually that wimp Tobias? But don't worry, I didn't kill him, not yet. But I did kill one of your friends already, at least he should be dead by now, my guys picked him up yesterday, something about taking him to the hospital to see his dad. Now, who might that be?"

"Marco!" I screamed in anger. I jumped towards him, until the chains that bound my wrists and ankles were at their limit and stopped me. In a moment I felt myself morph ever so slightly, I was morphing tiger before I knew it. But David didn't see it, he was too busy laughing.

Wwwhhaaamm! The guy with the bat slammed it into my head, slamming it back. I started demorphing back to human.

I fell back to the ground, my vision blurred and me coughing up blood.

"Now now Jake."David said. "If you keep doing that you're going to end up hurting yourself. You didn't even let me get to the good part, I have something planned for all of your little friends. Now I have to admit, I misspoke, Marco is not dead, not yet anyway. But someone will die, one of your little Animorphs."


	17. Chapter 17: Tom

Chapter 17: Tom:

"Hey, Tom, have you seen your brother?" It was my host's mother, it and my host's father were leaving in a few minutes to go on a trip over the weekend. I was on the computer finishing up some work for Chapman. I had to be leaving in a few minutes to go to the Sharing camping trip. It had better not bother me, because I might just drag it to the pool myself.

"What?" I asked back, trying my hardest to sound happy and upbeat.

"Have you seen Jake, he was supposed to be back by dinner and now it's after eight. I'm starting to get worried."

"I bet he's fine, mom, he's probably just with Marco at the hospital." I was starting to get fed up with this human. "That's where he told me he was going after we went to get lunch."

"Can you go over there and pick him up then? Go ahead and pick up Marco too, with his dad in the hospital and his mom out of town he might be staying at our house for a few days at least while we're gone, I already gave Jake permission to let Marco stay over if he needed to ." It told me as it handed me the keys to my car.

"But I have important stuff to do. I was going on that overnight Sharing trip remember?"

"Well you can do that after you pick up Jake and Marco from the hospital."

"Fine. I'll go pick up the munchkin and his little friend from the hospital." I tried to sound happy and upbeat but this woman was getting on my nerves.


	18. Chapter 18: Tobias: Being Compliant

Chapter 18: Tobias: Being Compliant

I woke to my body screaming in pain. I was feeling the most pain I have ever felt in my life. I couldn't feel my wings. I felt my ribs broken, moving inside of my chest with every breath. I tried to open my eyes, but my left eye was gone, and my right was barely working. The side of my eye saw only red. I tried my best to look around, I was in a metal cage just tall enough to stand up in in my hawk body, far too small to morph anything larger like my human form. My right leg had a thin metal rod drilled through it which was connected to a chain to the side of the cage.

But where was I? I couldn't see very well in the darkness, but I could hear what I assumed were humans walking around the room. I could hear at least three or four people walking around. I also heard something that my hawk brain recognized that my human brain didn't even notice. Long, thick claws scraping on the floor. The creature sounded very large but not large enough to be a Hork-Bajir. It sounded to have four legs, a tiger, lion or maybe a bear. A bear! I thought, the bear could be Rachel! But if it were her she would of talked to me already and freed me. So what was walking around and where am I?

"Hey," a gruff, low voice said. "The little birdies awake." He stepped closer and stuck his finger through the bars and poked me in the ribs. The pain was unbearable, I felt one of the ribs hit my lung.

"Hey, go wake the other one, the bird is awake and the other boy will be here soon." The man with the gruff voice said, but who was he talking to? And who were these other people? Were they the others? Could it be Jake or Marco who was going to be here?

[Jake, Marco, are you there? Rachel?]

"Tobias?" It was Jake, he sounded in pain, most likely he was captured too.

[Jake where are we? Is anyone else here?]

"I'll tell you where you are, you're with me and my friends. And don't worry, your friends will be here soon."

[David! How are you here? What's going on?!]

"I'll tell you what's going on." He remarked. "I won, you lost."

"You haven't won yet," Jake shot back weakly, almost out of breath. "The others are still out there. Two of us down is barely a victory."

"Hmph, what? You get that out of a fortune cookie? And plus, lights." He stopped, and on his command the lights turned on. I could see the room, there were seven pillars that connected to the ceiling, my cage was chained to one and Jake was on the one opposite side to me. I could see David, he had two other guys standing next to him. On the far side of the room to the right I could see a panther pacing back and forth. So that's where the claw sounds were coming from.

"Bring him in." David said as he waved to some guys in the hallway. They were dragging someone in, the person had a bag over it's head. From the way David was talking about _him,_ he could only be Marco.

"Put him one space away from Jake. And take that bag off his head, I want them to see him."

The bag was taken off his head, it was Marco. He wasn't moving, his head was split open, bleeding everywhere. His arms and legs were chained to the pillar just like Jake.

[Marco! Are you okay?] I yelled in thought speak. Why was Jake not saying anything? Why wasn't he threatening David's life? Marco could be dead.

"Oh Marco's just fine, Tobias." David smirked. "He's just taking a little nap. Guys! Wake him up." He walked over to Jake and whispered something in Jake's ear.

What were they talking about? Jake was just nodding, not saying anything but an occasional yes, or okay. They talked for only a minute, but I saw Jake's face sink and grow disgusted.

"Do you understand Jake? Do you know what I want?" He backed away from Jake and smiled at him.

"Understood" Jake managed finally.

"Now," David said, talking to everyone. "Time for some fun. Jorge!" He called out to one of the men around us and motioned for him. "It's time for you to get our next guest. But let me ask you something, what is Jake's favorite morph?"

"A Bengal tiger, sir" Jorge answered quickly. Strange, he called David sir.

"Correct, so pick her up as Bengal Tiger, just thrown her around a bit, but don't do too much damage."

"Cassie." Jake said weakly. "Be strong."

[David! What do you want? What are you doing? Leave Cassie alone, you have the three of us, that's enough. You-] Jake broke me off.

"Shut up, Tobias, just do as he says." His voice was a combination of anger, hatred, and sorrow. "It'll be best for her to be here."

[Jake. What are you saying? They almost killed me to get me here. They could do the same to her! What is wrong with you?]

"Stop Tobias. David is in control, we should just do as he said. The others will be here shortly, I'll handle it."

"Listen to him Tobias, Jake, the leader of the former Animorphs. Look at him, he's not fighting this. He has accepted his fate."

I stared at Jake in silence, how could he be wanting David to capture Cassie? And what did David tell him to make him so compliant?


	19. Chapter 19: Cassie: The Tiger

Chapter 19: Cassie: The Tiger

"It's fine, Jake," I said to him, he was offering to walk me home. "I can just fly home, plus, I need some time to think."

"Well, if that's what you want, then I'm fine with it."

I turned away from Jake and headed into the woods on the outskirts of town to morph into osprey and fly home. I walked for a few minutes to make sure I was far enough away from the road as I could so no one would see me morph.

I stopped in a clearing and started imagining the osprey in my mind. Morphing is always unpredictable, this time the first things that changed were my feet. They slowly started turning into deadly talons. I always love flying, it's one of the best feelings in the world, the feeling of absolute freedom. My legs and chest were beginning to form next when I saw something out of the corner of my eye that almost made me scream. It was a fully grown Bengal tiger crouched several yards away in the bushes.

"Jake? Is that you?" I yelled. "What are you doing, you scared me half to-"

The tiger lunged at me before I could finish. It's definitely not Jake, he'd never attack me, so was this an actual tiger, did it escape from the gardens and escaped into the woods and attacked me because it saw me morph?

"Grrrooowwww!" The tiger roared. I was almost morphed, the only things yet to morph were my wings. I tried to run but the tiger swatted me to the ground with one massive paw.

It's strength is insane, it hit my left wing as it was forming and it immediately snapped in two. I was helpless now, I was a bird who couldn't fly, I was dead.

The tiger rolled me around on the ground for a few minutes with it's paws, breaking my other wing and knocking me half conscious. It was weird, the tiger was not killing me, even if it had escaped from the Gardens and had never hunted before in it's life, it's instincts would have kicked in and it would have killed me, not just rolling me around.

A few minutes passed when the tiger stopped rolling me around and it walked a few feet away and turned towards me. Then it did something that almost made my heart stop, it started to morph.


	20. Chapter 20: Ax: Gut Feeling

Chapter 20: Ax: The Gut Feeling

Prince Jake sent me out to search the woods for Tobias, which I have to admit is a very difficult task, the woods that we live in cover an extremely large area and Tobias has several hunting grounds. I was getting very worried for Tobias, no one has seen him since last night, while I consider all my human friends my family here on earth Tobias is my actual family, my brother's child, my nephew, my _shorm_. Both Prince Jake and Rachel were attacked by animals yesterday around the same time and Marco's father was attacked by a human male, I am not aware if the other's suspect foul play but I do not believe these to be coincidences, I believe that someone is trying to take us out one by one. Now with Cassie avoiding Prince Jake and ignoring him when he tries to call her I am beginning to wonder if Cassie is a Controller or some sort of imposter. But if Cassie were a controller than Visser Three would have taken us as hosts by now because Cassie knows all our secrets. So the only other explanation is that someone who is not a Yeerk is impersonating her, but I have no idea who it could be.

I do not know, maybe I am just worrying too much. I just realized that I was not paying attention to where I was flying and I ended up on the outskirts of town. I was just about to turn around and head back to the _scoop_ just in case Tobias had returned when I saw a flash of black and orange in the woods a few hundred feet to my left. I recognized that streak of colors instantly, I have seen them hundreds of times in battle, these were the colors of a tiger, an extremely fierce and dangerous earth animal that I've seen first hand many times.

But why was a tiger in the woods? I was under the impression that they did not live in this area. At least that is what Tobias told me. Then it hit me, this tiger must be Prince Jake in morph. Did he find whoever was attacking us? I changed direction as soon as I could and began flapping frantically as fast as I could to catch up to him.

He ran through the woods for a few hundred feet before he immediately stopped and began crawling through the bushes as though he was stalking prey. I got within range of thought speak of him when I had this feeling in my mind, I can not explain it but something was telling me to not speak or approach him and to see what he was doing. I have been informed by Marco that this feeling is called a _gut feeling_ and that I should always follow my gut, especially when it comes to the _ladies_ as he called them, which I have to say does not concern me because I am not interested in earth females, and to always listen to my gut when it senses danger. We Andalites do not believe in this gut feeling but I have grown to trust it more and more with every mission. I do not know why but my gut told me not to talk to Prince Jake and to follow him so I listened to it.

I flew past who I thought was Prince Jake to see what he was following and it surprised me to see that it was Cassie walking into a clearing. Was Prince Jake suspicious of Cassie as well and was just following her to see what she was doing?

I soared above her for a minute when I saw her begin to morph, during this time Prince Jake moved closer and closer to her until he was ten yards from her.

I was watching to see what Prince Jake would do when in the blink of an eye he ran at her and began attacking her. This proved to me that this was not Prince Jake, he would never attack one of us, especially Cassie since they have formed a relationship and pairing with each other. So this must be Cassie being attacked by someone pretending to be Prince Jake, as a bird she could not defend herself so I went in to an immediate dive to get to her as soon as I could, but as a bird I could not do anything either so I would have to demorph to be able to help, hopefully Cassie would be able to fly away before the imposter could get her.


	21. Chapter 21: Cassie: The Tiger Speaks

Chapter 21: Cassie: The Tiger Speaks

I could not believe what I was seeing, the tiger that had just been attacking me for the past few minutes was standing before me and demorphing to human.

[Jake?] I called out weakly. [Is that you? Why… why did you attack me, what did I do?]

[You think that I am Jake?] The tiger spoke back, I could see as it demorphed further that it was not Jake. [Sorry to disappoint lady, but the name's Jorge, and I've been sent here to-] Without a sound a light blue and tan blur slammed into the demorphing tiger knocking him over.

[Ax!] I yelled, I would've been dead if he hadn't show up.

[Is that really you, Cassie?] He asked without taking his main eyes off the person in front of him.

[Of course I am, who else would I be?]

[I was suspecting that you were an imposter because of your strange behaviors but it seems that I was wrong. Do you know who this human is?]

The person laying on the ground looked to be in his twenties, he was very large and muscular. He was just laying there smiling at Ax.

"So, you're an Andalite," Jorge said. "I have to admit that I had a hard time believing that something like you existed."

[You know of Andalites and you obviously have the Andalite ability to morph, so who are you human?]

"Like I'd tell you anything, alien." Jorge said as he stood up and patted himself off.

In a flash Ax swung his tail at him and pressed his tail blade against his neck. Jorge didn't even flinch, he just stood there staring at Ax.

[You will tell me who you are human and why you have attacked Cassie and have been attacking us.]

"So you know that we've been attacking your little team huh? Well that's to be expected, you're supposed to be really smart."

[Who are you and why are you attacking us?] Ax said a little louder as he pressed his tail blade harder on his neck.

"You don't scare me alien, you're a race that believes in honor right? So there's no way you'd kill an unarmed opponent, I'm helpless as a human against you." Jorge said all of this with the utmost confidence, it was clear that whoever he was that he knew a lot about Andalites.

[How do you know of Andalites?] Ax was yelling now inside our heads. [Who are you?]

From behind me I heard something moving through the bushes. Ax must have heard it too because his left stalk eye looked in the direction the noise came from.

[Who is there?] Ax yelled. [Are they with you?] He asked Jorge. Jorge just smiled.

"Ax, calm down, it's just me." It was Jake. Jake stepped out of the bushes and walked towards me and placed his foot on my back.

[Prince Jake, what are you doing?] Ax demanded. [That is Cassie you are stepping on, this human here was attacking her and I stopped him.]

"Hold on, Ax, you don't know what is going on, you're confused. This," He said pointing to me as he pressed harder onto my back, "Is not Cassie, this is an enemy in disguise. And that man there is a friend of mine, he was helping me find her, so if you would please, let him go."


	22. Chapter 22: Ax: Ax's Doubt

Chapter 22: Ax: Ax's Doubt

[I do not understand Prince Jake, what is going on, what are you talking about?]

"Ax, this bird is not Cassie, this is a random human sent by Crayak to infiltrate and kill us. The Ellimist spoke to me earlier and told me everything, there is an army of humans out there who can morph so he sent some humans who can morph to help us."

[The Ellimist spoke to you alone without the rest of us?] I asked, that didn't make any sense to me.

"Yes he did, everyone else was not available at the time so he just spoke to me. Ax, we don't have time for questions, the others are in trouble and I need your help to save them."

When I first saw Prince Jake step out of the bushes I felt a sigh of relief, I did not know what was going on and he'd have the answers. But as I was talking to him the voice in my head came back and told me not to trust him. I was trying to shake that voice from my head but it wouldn't leave.

[Prince Jake I am still not understanding what is going on, who is this bird here then, and who is this human here?]

"That person there name's Jorge, you can trust him, The Ellimist sent him and I trust him. That bird there is just a person morphed as a bird." Prince Jake smiled as he stepped towards me.

[But I saw Cassie morph into this bird, how could a person morph from Cassie straight into a bird?] The smile left his face.

He stood there for a second and smiled again as he said; "That's simple, The Crayak gave them the ability to go from one morph to another to have the advantage over us."

"Ax, don't listen to him, that's not Jake, he's the fake." Cassie yelled, she morphed back to human and was sitting on the grass behind him.

"Listen to me, Ax," Prince Jake said, "This person is trying to confuse us by pretending to be Cassie. He need to take care of her so we can find the real Cassie."

"Ax, please," Cassie practically yelled, "Listen to me, Jake is the one that is the impostor, he almost killed me earlier."

"Ax, I am your Prince, and as your Prince I'm telling you to let Jorge go and grab Cassie before she morphs again, as human I can't do anything."

I was really conflicted, I did not know who to believe, I know that Jake, my Prince would never lie to me but I also knew that Cassie would never lie to me either. I also know that Prince Jake would never hurt Cassie so she must be the impostor. But what if Prince Jake were the impostor? I could not know for sure, the only way to know who was real now would be to ask them questions only they knew, but if they were controllers than that would be pointless, but as a morph the impostor would get their instincts but not their memories. So I needed to test them to see who was the impostor, but what would I ask? While I spend a lot of time with both of them I am not to good at reading human facial expressions and human emotion to tell if they knew the answer or not.

I thought about it for seconds when I thought of the perfect question to ask them to be sure, an incredibly personal question that only the real Prince Jake or Cassie would know.

"Ax?" Prince Jake asked, sounding a little irritated. "Are you listening to me or not?"

[Sorry, Prince Jake, but to be sure as to who is the impostor I would like to ask the two of you some questions to determine who is the real one.]

"Ax we don't really have time for this, we need to get going and contact the others asap."

[I'm sorry, Prince Jake, but I must insist.]

"Fine then, let's get it over with already so we can go."

[I will ask both of you the same question and you will give me your answers separately.]

"What kind of question is it?" Cassie asked me as she kept looking back to Prince Jake and Jorge.

[In order for me to be completely certain about which of you is the impostor the question is sort of personal and might be a difficult topic to talk about if I understand human emotions clearly, especially you two in particular.]

I could see that Cassie was worried about the question I was going to ask while Prince Jake looked a little annoyed and nothing more.

I let go of the human named Jorge and brought Cassie to the side and began to talk to her.

[Cassie, we are far enough from Jake so he can't hear us so I am going to speak freely.]

"You called him Jake? What about Prince, I thought that you only called him Prince Jake?" Cassie whispered to me.

[That is because I do not believe this person to be Prince Jake, but in order to know for sure I still need to ask you both a question. Do you understand?]

"I do, but what did you mean about this being a personal question and being hard to talk about for us?" Cassie asked with a little fear in her eyes.

[I need a question that only a member of our group would know.]

"Okay, I understand, ask away." She said without hesitation.

I almost tried to clear my throat until I realized that I do not have a mouth, it is a human action that I have been doing more and more recently when I am about to say something that is difficult to talk about.

What is the Golden Rule that Prince Jake made for the group?

"What?!" Cassie asked as her eyes widened till they seemed they were about to become too large for her face. "How do you know about that? That was just supposed to stay between Rachel, Tobias, Jake and I. Tobias told you didn't he?" She sighed.

[Will you please answer and say what the Golden Rule that Prince Jake made for us Animorphs is?]

"Yeah, sorry, I'm just a little surprised and embarrassed that you know about that. Simply," She said as she took a deep breath, "It's a rule that Jake made for the couples in the group, that being Rachel, Tobias, He and I, that we are not allowed to,.. Uh,.."

[Please, hurry up, Cassie, we are running low on time.]

"We basically aren't allowed to sleep with each other or anything like that, we all agreed that while it may be,... uh,... fun,... to do, we don't need any kids running around while we're fighting the Yeerks. Rachel came up with that last line by the way."

[Thank you, Cassie, and to answer your question, yes, Tobias told me the other day when I overheard him talking to Rachel in human morph. Rachel was saying that the rule was unfair and the Prince Jake had no right to say what they could or could not do.]

"She said that, did she? Well, I can kinda see her point, but we all agreed that it was a good idea. So did I pass your test or not?"

[You passed as I expected, this means that Jake is the impostor. But I still need to ask him the question so he does not become suspicious.]

I left Cassie on the far side of the meadow and headed towards the impostor posing as Prince Jake. I did not know who this person was but I knew one thing, that Prince Jake would never let himself be acquired by the enemy, and that he must be a prisoner of these impostors. I would do anything for my Prince and for my friends, I was going to make this human suffer for posing as my Prince and for capturing him.


	23. Chapter 23: Cassie: The Impostor

Chapter 23: Cassie: The Impostor

Ax left to go talk to the person posing as Jake. I was worried beyond belief, what had happened to Jake, and how long has this imposter been posing as him? Then the thought hit me like a tonne of bricks, it must have been an imposter that called me last night and yelled at me, it also had to be an imposter that tried to get me to sleep with him tonight. I couldn't think straight, I had decided to go to his house after my parents went to sleep, what would've happened if I did? I should've known that Jake would've never acted like that. I felt so stupid.

While I was thinking about this I could see that 'Jake' was getting very frustrated and was starting to yell at Ax. Before I could blink, Ax had his tail blade to the imposter's neck.

I quickly ran over to Ax and the imposter to see what was going on.

[Demorph and explain who and what you are immediately or I will kill you where you stand!] Ax was yelling and threatening the imposter's life, I knew the Ax would not normally just kill someone in cold blood but I knew that Ax was worried about Jake just like me.

"You wouldn't dare kill me alien, I'm morphed as your oh so precious leader, you could never do it."

[You are wrong, human,] Ax said calmly as he pressed his tail blade into his neck as it drew blood. [I know that you are not my Prince, you are using his form and name to try to trick me. Now,] Ax said as his voice grew louder and more intense. [Tell me where Prince Jake and the others are so I can kill you quickly and move on.]

"You'll get nothing out of me, alien." At this moment Jorge ran at Ax with a knife, Ax simply smacked him upside the head with his tail knocking him out.

[Answer my question now or I will remove a limb.]

"A wha..." He began to ask when Ax twitched his tail and removed the imposter's left hand.

"AAAHHHHH!" He screamed in pain.

[Every time that you do not answer my question I will remove a limb.] Ax said coldly, [Simple enough human?]

"Yeah, yeah, I understand!" The imposter said frantically as he held the place where his hand used to be. "We were sent to capture Cassie and bring her to the others, then Rachel and finally you since you would be the hardest to capture."

[Who is we?] Ax asked.

"And are you saying that Jake, Marco and Tobias are already captured?" I asked, my mind racing.

"And here I was under the impression that Marco was the dumb one." 'Jake' said with a smile.

[Answer her question or you will lose another hand.]

"You're a total buzzkill, you know, alien?"

[I am losing my patience with you, human. [Ax said with a growl, [Tell me where Prince Jake is now!] Ax almost never yells, so when he does, honestly, it scares me a bit. He was holding this person's life in his hand and there would be nothing I could do to stop Ax from killing him.

"Where are the others? Tell me, are Jake and the others safe?"

"I seriously doubt that, lady." Ax pressed his tail blade on 'Jake's' right wrist.

'"Okay okay okay, fine. The others are alive at least, we are not allowed to kill anyone until the time is right."

"What do you mean by that?" I asked.

"I don't know, that's just what we were told, David said; "None of the Animorphs are allowed to be killed until we get them all together and the decision is made." That's what he said word for word, now can you get your alien pet to let me go? I'm bleeding to death over here! "

[David?] Ax hissed.

"Did you say David?" I asked, shocked.

"Yeah, David. I wasn't supposed to tell you that, huh,... well yes, David sent us to capture you Animorphs. Jorge and I were sent to capture you but of course this alien here just had to stick his hoof where it didn't belong."

"What about Rachel?" I asked, worried for Rachel.

"As we speak four other guys are picking Rachel up to bring her to the others."

[You sent four humans to abduct Rachel?] Ax asked, his main eyes widening, as he began to quietly laugh to himself out loud. [Four humans against Rachel,... not even a fair fight,... for them.]

"We were all warned about Rachel beforehand, believe me, we were told not to underestimate her, that's why they are bringing some insurance along with them to pick her up."

"What do you mean by insurance?"

"I don't know, you know, it's not like he tells all of us everything, we are as much in the dark about this as you are."

[Then why do you follow him? If you do not know his plan? Do you even know anything about the person you are following?]

"I know all I need to know, he gave me powers that make me unstoppable and he can make me filthy rich. So he's a bit bossy and egotistical, who cares, he's going to make us rich beyond our dreams. All we have to do is listen to what he says for a few weeks and bring him all of you and he'll let us go and do whatever we want."

"How do you know that David won't just betray you after you do what he wants? You know nothing about him, don't you?"


	24. Chapter 24: Rachel: The Grizzly's Rage

Chapter 24: Rachel: The Grizzly's Rage

After the incident at the mall with the mountain lions I continued to fly around the town for a few hours, having to land and demorph then morph again looking for the others. I had already searched Cassie's barn, Tobias's meadow and Ax's scoop but hadn't found anyone. I was flying over Jake's house when I saw his parents packing the car and drive off. That's right, I thought to myself. His parents were going out of town for the weekend so he'd have all night to search for Tobias.

I was running out of ideas where to look for the others and was quickly running out of light as the sun was beginning to set. I decided that I need to make an appearance at home so my mother didn't worry and say that I was going over to Cassie's for a sleepover so I could continue looking for the others all night without my mom wondering where I was.

I was going to fly through my window but when I flew by I saw that someone had closed it, strange, I thought. Because I knew that I had locked my room before I left and I didn't let my family in my room anymore.

So I flew to the roof of a closed Burger King where I and the others left some normal clothes since it was close to our houses. I slid my outer clothes over my morphing suit, threw my shoes on and climbed down the ladder that ran into an alleyway.

I was walking up the driveway when I saw that the front door was slightly open, that's weird, I thought to myself, my mom was a stickler when it came to leaving the front door open. I walked up the front steps and saw that the lock on the door and the latch on the door frame were broken. I drew my hand from the door as fast as I could, looking around trying to see if anyone was around my house. The first thought that came to mind was that someone broke in my house and had attacked my mom and sisters. I stepped back a few feet and considered morphing grizzly just in case they were still in there, but what if no one had broken into my house and I stormed in as a bear, how would I be able to explain that?

I couldn't decide what to do so I tried to sneak in the house as quiet as I could to find out what had happened.

I entered my living room and saw that it was a mess, even more than it was yesterday with the whole mountain lion fiasco. The couch was flipped and the coffee table was splinters against the far wall.

Then suddenly I heard a faint sound coming from the kitchen. A sound that sent a chill down my spine; muffled crying. That threw my mind into a frenzy, several emotions were fighting for control; Fear, Anger, Worry, and Helplessness.

I was morphing grizzly before I could think about what I was doing, if my mom and sisters were being held captive behind this door then I want the ability to severely punish whoever had done this to them.

I was almost full Grizzly when I threw open the kitchen door with pure Grizzly might, knocking it off its hinges and into the wall. I rushed into the room on all fours slamming through the table in the process.

Before me were two blurry figures standing next to three even more blurry figures lying on the ground. Dammit, I thought to myself, Grizzly was perfect for kicking butt and taking names but I couldn't see who was standing in front of me. But that didn't matter, because I knew the three people who were lying on the floor in front of me, screaming, crying and flailing around on the floor because a grizzly bear just burst through the door.

[Mom!] I yelled in open thought speak before I could stop myself, [Jordan, Sarah, don't worry, it's me, I'm going to get you out of here.]

"Rachel?" I heard my mom say with the sound of hope in her voice. "Is that really you?"

[Yeah mom, it's really me, I'm going to get you all out of here as soon as I kick some butt.]

"Ah, isn't that sweet?" The guy on the left said with a sarcastic voice, "The wittle bear thinks she's going to save her mommy." Wait, this guy knew I was the bear? Any normal person would cry for their mommy as they wet their pants if a grizzly burst into the room and started talking. Are these guys Yeerks, did Visser three finally figure out that the so called Andalite Bandits were actually a small group of seventeen year olds? If he did then why were there only two humans? I'd expect nothing less than a dozen Hork-Bajir, but not two humans. Whatever or whoever they were they were going down.

[Wittle bear?] I asked as with a laugh as I stood on my back legs with my head scratching the ceiling.

"I wouldn't do that if I were you," This time it was the guy on the right. "If you even twitch we'll kill your family, right here, right now."

[And how exactly do you plan on taking me on with only the two of you as humans?]

"Who said anything about it just being the two of us? Did you Pedro?" They guy on the left asked the guy on the right, laughing.

"Do you really think that we'd be stupid enough to take you on by ourselves? Hell no, we were warned about you, told not to underestimate you. And that's why we brought them along with us." Pedro said as he pointed behind me.

Behind me two very large blurs burst into the room. I recognized the scent of the larger one as a polar bear but the smaller one was a mystery to me. I figured that it was a big cat of some kind, not a tiger or lion, probably a panther or something. Not that it mattered, in my grizzly morph I'm practically unstoppable.

[Who are you?] I roared in thought speak. [How are you able to morph? What are you doing with my family?]

"We're here to bring you to a little reunion party with all of your closest friends, really, you wouldn't want to miss it, believe me, everyone will be there." Pedro answered back. "Everyone from your cousin to your boyfriend, even your best friend, and I know that they'd all hate for you to miss the party, so you should just demorph and come with us."

No way, I thought, they had to be bluffing, there was no way that all the others could be captured so easily. Who were these guys? How can they have the ability to morph. But I didn't care, if the others were captured then I was their only hope, and most likely the last hope for the human race if they were all killed. Whatever it takes I'm going to take these guys down and rescue the others.

The polar bear and whatever cat that it was were about fifteen feet away behind me, in order to save my family and take down the two guys standing by them I'd have to take down the two in morph first. The polar bear would be the tricky one, he had three feet and a few hundred pounds on me, but in this confined space his bulk would be a disadvantage. The big cat though, had me worried, it would be able to make use of it's reflexes and acrobatics to avoid me and fight in this confined area.

I'll take out the polar bear first because he'd be the stronger one. I was thinking back to the time I had tried to pin down Nanook when we were stuck in the North Pole, this was going to be very difficult by myself.

In a blink of an eye the big cat lunged at my face, grabbing and attaching itself to my muzzle, clawing and biting me at the same time.

"Grrooowwwrrrr!" I roared, grabbing the big cat from my face and slamming it into the floor with pure grizzly might, knocking the wind out of it and shattering the tile floor that used to be there. Taking advantage of having the wind knocked out of it I picked up the big cat and threw it at the polar bear knocking it over. I spun around to run to my family when I was met with two other big cats standing where Pedro and the other guy stood.

[What the hell?] I yelled, [How did you two morph that fast?] I stood there stunned, wondering how they could morph in just a few seconds when it took Cassie a few minutes.

Before I could think the two big cats who I could now see were mountain lions lunged at me. I swatted one away into the wall but the other grabbed a hold of my left back leg as I stood at full grizzly height.

"Grrooowwwrrrr!" I roared in pain as I could feel the blood rushing from my leg.

Suddenly from behind me the polar bear tackled me and was attempting to hold me down, the other mountain lion went for my other back leg as the other big cat went for my throat trying to tear it apart.

While this was happening I could hear my mom and sisters screaming and crying. "Rachel," I heard my mom manage to say over my sister's crying, "please…"

[Mom!] I yelled, screaming in pain, [Don't worry, I'll save you.]

[Just give it up already, we have you beat.] Pedro yelled.

[Never, I'll never let you hurt my family.]

"Just do as he says, Rachel," My mother yelled frantically, "They said that if you go with them that they'll leave and wouldn't hurt you. If you keep fighting then you will die, if you go with them then at least you'll be safe."

This stunned me, my own mother was telling me to give up and go with the guys trying to kill me. I couldn't believe what she was saying.

[Your mommie's right, Rachel, if you surrender and come with us then we'll leave your family alone.]

What should I do? I don't trust these people but if I keep fighting then they will kill me and then my family will be helpless.

Then all of a sudden a voiceless thought popped into my head;

{{BE CALM, RACHEL, LISTEN TO YOUR MOTHER AND GO WITH THEM.}}

Ellimist? I thought, this isn't exactly the best time right now, I'm kinda busy here.

{{I KNOW. LISTEN TO ME, GO WITH THEM, ALL WILL BE MADE CLEAR SOON ENOUGH.}}

But what about my family? You can't just expect me to abandon them.

{{I WOULD NEVER ASK THAT FROM YOU, DO NOT WORRY, I WILL WATCH OVER THEM. TIME IS OF THE ESSENCE, YOU MUST GO NOW.}}

I don't understand, I thought. But as soon as I felt his presence appear, he disappeared. You better be right about this, Ellimist, I thought.

With my mind popping back into reality all I could feel was pain as they were trying to remove my legs.

[Stop] I yelled to them all. [I surrender, let them go. I will go with you.]

They all backed away and watched me closely as I demorphed.

After I finished demorphing they led me out of my destroyed house and into the back of a van where they duct taped my hands and feet and threw a bag over my head.

I thought of morphing back to grizzly and taking them down when they were separated but The Ellimist's words stayed on my mind, no, I thought, I should trust him and wait until he tells me what to do.


	25. Chapter 25: Ax: The Chase

Chapter 25: Ax: The Chase

[Tell me where Prince Jake and the others are immediately or you will lose another hand.] I threatened the imposter posing as Prince Jake as I started pressing my tail blade onto his wrist. As I was about to slice his hand off my right stalk eye saw a golden blur burst through the bushes and run at me with tremendous speed, clearing the meadow in a split second.

The creature jumped at me with large claws extended before I could react. The creature knocked me over while it left a large scar down my side before it ran off while another identical creature took it's place attacking me with tremendous speed.

What was attacking me, I thought, it was running too fast for my eye to track it properly.

"Ax!" Cassie yelled as she started to morph into wolf and run over to me.

[No Cassie,] I yelled at her, holding my hand out in front of me, a very human motion, [You must run and free Prince Jake and the others.]

[But Ax,] She pleaded, more wolf than human now. [Those cheetahs are going to kill you if I leave, I have to help you.]

[Prince Jake would never forgive me for letting you die in my place, Cassie, you must run, go, go save yourself and free the others. I will rejoin you when I am able.]

[Ax] She said, turning around, [I'm sorry, I'll get Rachel and we'll rescue you.]

[No, find Rachel and tell the Chee what is happening, come up with a plan then rescue Prince Jake and the others.]

[I'm sorry, Ax.] I heard Cassie say as she ran through the trees. [We'll rescue you as soon as we can.]

I looked to see if Cassie was being followed when the first cheetah returned and starting running after me. So I started running at full speed in the other direction through the trees. I have morphed a cheetah before so I have some basic knowledge about them. I knew that they were the fastest animals on Earth so there was no way that I would be able to outrun them, but I also knew that they could not run for very long without collapsing, normally not more than a minute or so. I would just have to hope that I could outrun them until they tired.

The second cheetah quickly joined the other as they both chased me through the forest. I started with about a thousand foot lead on my two pursuers but they were quickly gaining on me. I was running through the dense trees trying to lose them when I saw a small river about twenty feet wide a few hundred feet in front of me. I knew from personal experience that while cheetahs can swim that they try to avoid to at all possible. Hopefully for my sake the cheetah's instinct will tell them not to follow me into the river.

The cheetahs were just under a hundred feet behind me when the started to slow down, after twenty more feet they immediately stopped and almost collapsed.

After they both collapsed on the ground I turned around and headed towards them, tail raised, preparing to take the opportunity to kill them before they could recuperate and chase me again.

I was just a dozen yards away when I saw that the two cheetahs were morphing, but they were not demorphing into their human forms, they were morphing straight into other animal forms, one into a very large polar bear and the other into an elephant. I would still be able to kill them with my tail blade before they finished morphing if I hurried.

But how are they able to go from one morph to another, I knew that the Escafil Device only let you morph into another creature after you demorphed. Did these humans obtain a new kind of Escafil Device that allowed morphing from one form to another? I still did not know who these humans were or how they had obtained an Escafil Device.

I was a few yards away when I saw that they had finished morphing in just a few seconds. That must be it, I thought, these humans must have obtained a new Escafil Device that was technologically superior to our own, allowing them to morph from one form to another and to morph in half a minute.

The elephant run at me at full speed, reaching its trunk out to grab me. I sliced the end of it's trunk off and turned to run when the polar bear swatted my legs out from under me with one giant paw. I crashed into the grass and landed wrong on my right front leg, sending a wave of pain down my body, I do not believe that it was broken but I do not believe that I can run on it anymore. With the two humans in morph next to me I would not be able to morph into northern harrier and fly away.

The polar bear was on top of me before I could blink, clawing up my stomach as I swung my tail to slice up it's face. The elephant grabbed my tail with it's now shortened trunk, holding it to the ground where it stepped on my tail pinning it to the ground.

Aaahhhhh! I screamed in pain, I felt the bones in my tail snap under the elephant's enormous weight.

With my left back leg I kicked at the elephant with no effect. It simply took my kicks without even flinching. The polar bear moved over to my upper body and raised one of its giant paws over my head.

Wwhhhaaamm! The bear slammed its paw into my head knocking it back into the ground. The bear raised its paw again and slammed into my face, over and over the bear slammed its massive paw into my face, after a few blows my vision started to blur and I was having trouble thinking clearly.

Cassie, I thought, please find Rachel and the Chee quickly. I hoped that Cassie was safe, if she were to be killed because of me I would not be able to face Prince Jake again. I knew that he cared a great deal for her since they were a couple. Please, be safe.

After a few more blows to my face I could feel myself losing consciousness, my vision was starting to turn dark as I couldn't feel any pain anymore when I lost consciousness.


	26. Chapter 26: Cassie: The Reveal

Chapter 26: Cassie

Ax was interrogating the person morphed as Jake when in the blink of an eye a cheetah ran out of the trees and attacked him. Ax was being sliced by the cheetah's large claws when I started to run forward and morph to wolf to help Ax.

"Ax!" I yelled, morphing to wolf.

[No Cassie,] He yelled at me, motioning for me to stay away. [You must run and free Prince Jake and the others.]

I tried to help him but he refused to let me help him saying that he didn't want me to die in his place and that Jake would not forgive him if I died in his place. No, I thought, Jake wouldn't want any of us to die, and he would not get mad at Ax if I died. That shouldn't matter, I should help him. But I ran anyway as soon as I finished morphing to wolf, I spun around and ran into the trees.

I ran for what seemed an eternity, hoping that every time I looked back to see Ax running behind me, but he never did. I ran and ran at full speed until my wolf body began to tire. I slowed down and stopped in a small meadow by some large moss covered rocks to catch my breath and demorph.

After I finished demorphing I sat on the ground leaning on a tree to catch my breath and come up with a plan.

I have to find Rachel, I thought, she might be the only one of us still out there. When I caught my breath enough to morph again I morphed to osprey and flew to Rachel's house.

I was really far from her house so it took me almost forty five minutes to get there. As I flew over her house I could see that practically the whole neighborhood was empty, still, almost frozen, with no people or cars or even animals to be seen.

I was going to demorph a few blocks away and go to her house as human but I thought that I might look a little strange walking in her house barefoot and in a skintight leotard. So I decided to land on her roof and try thought speak and see if she was there.

[Rachel?] I called out wearily. [Are you there?] Nothing, then suddenly a voice in my head spoke;

{RACHEL IS NOT HERE.}

Ellimist? I thought, where is Rachel, I need to find her and rescue the others. I need to see if she's okay.

{DO NOT WORRY, SHE IS WITH THE OTHERS. WHILE SHE IS HURT SHE IS SAFE WHERE SHE IS. SHE WILL BE FINE, DO NOT WORRY.}

What happened to everyone, where are they?

{THEY HAVE ALL BEEN CAPTURED BY DAVID, YOU MUST ALLOW YOURSELF TO BE CAPTURED AND TAKEN TO THEM.}

What are you saying? How could you want me to let myself be captured? I need to free the others.

{LISTEN TO ME, CASSIE, YOU NEED TO LET YOURSELF BE CAPTURED. I TOLD RACHEL THE SAME THING, OF COURSE SHE PROTESTED BUT SHE EVENTUALLY LET HERSELF BE CAPTURED. YOU NEED TO TRUST ME, AS WELL AS JAKE. LISTEN TO HIM AND DO AS HE SAYS.}

I don't understand, Ellimist, but if you truly think that I should let myself be captured then I will. But what were you saying about listening to Jake? Does Jake already know what's going on, did you already talk to him?

{YOU MUST GO NOW, CASSIE. THERE ARE TWO BIRDS ON THEIR WAY TO YOU NOW. YOU MUST GO WITH THEM.}

Can you at least tell me what's going on and how David is back? We left him on that island trapped in morph, how did he get his human form back?

Nothing. He didn't answer and I couldn't sense him anymore so he must have left. Great, I thought, I have no idea what's going on and I have to let some people capture me and bring me to the others and to David. Hopefully Jake, Rachel, Ax and the others are okay. I hope that Ax got away from the two cheetahs attacking him. But from how the Ellimist was talking all the others are with David.

Ellimist? I asked, are you there? Nothing, just silence throughout the neighborhood as I sat on Rachel's roof waiting to be attacked and taken to the others. Sometimes I hate being an Animorph.

From Rachel's roof I had a clear line of sight of the sky around me, so I scanned the skies with my powerful osprey vision. At first I thought it might be a little difficult knowing what morph the two people were going to use but I didn't see a single bird or animal for that matter the entire time that I was by Rachel's house until I saw two giant birds flying towards me, both several times larger than me.

The larger of the two was some kind of massive black vulture that had what to be a ten plus foot wingspan. The smaller of the two, and by smaller I mean compared to the vulture, some kind of beautiful brown and white eagle that had a wingspan of almost seven feet. While smaller, the eagle had me worried the most since it was the more dangerous of the two. The vulture ate mostly carrion so it's aerial hunting skills won't be very much.

As I watched them the eagle broke off at amazing speed and circled to get behind me as the vulture powered towards me with it's giant body, this vulture was more than two feet larger than me and had a wingspan twice the size of my own. Good thing the Ellimist's plan was for me to lose, I thought to myself and to him if he were still there, there would be no way I'd be able to win.

I lost sight of the eagle as it flew above the clouds, I flew higher and higher to be able to dive and attack if necessary when the giant vulture dove towards me, it's massive wings outstretched, blocking out the sun as it reached for me with it's huge talons.

I spiraled away from the vulture as the eagle tore through the sky like a guided missile towards me. How stupid of me, I thought, the vulture was just a distraction so the better of the two, the eagle could attack me from the back.

Whhaaammm! Aaahhhh! I screamed, as the eagle slammed into me and drove it's deadly talons into my back. The eagle shredded up my back before letting me go and dropping me a few thousand feet up in the air. I tried to flap but I couldn't feel my wings. I fell for almost a hundred feet when the massive vulture suddenly swooped down and caught me with it's talons. I tried to break free but it was pointless, besides, I thought, the Ellimist told me to get caught.

I hope you know what you're doing, Ellimist, I said to thin air as the vulture carried me into the woods.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Fifteen minutes later the vulture dropped me in a clearing and flew off as the eagle told me to demorph, disappearing. At first I didn't want to but I realized that I should do what they said and more importantly that my two hour time limit was almost up.

I quickly demorphed to human, happy to be in a form that wasn't fighting for every last breath, happy to not be in pain anymore. I stood there in my morphing suit waiting to be told what to do when a guy dressed in very tight gym shorts and a tank top stepped out of the bushes and walked towards me. He looked to be in his twenties, really tall and muscular with spiky hair. His morphing suit was way too thin, almost see through and tight on his muscular body, as he walked I could see every muscle and everything move under his suit, and I mean everything. I tried not to look at it as it moved as he walked. He stopped a few feet in front of me and smirked, looking me up and down in my morphing suit. I could easily tell that he was staring at my chest in my skin tight and way too small leotard. I felt both furious and embarrassed as this random guy stared at my chest, smirking to himself. He stepped towards me, hand raised at my chest as I tried to step back but backed into a tree instead.

I stared at him as he stepped closer to me when he launched towards me as I jumped to the side and rolled into another tree. I was getting up trying to run away when he grabbed my arm and pulled me to him.

"Aahh!" I yelled, "Let me go."

"Not a chance, babe," He replied, laughing to himself, "David wanted you as soon as possible but I don't see why I can't have a little fun with you first." As he grabbed me by my waist and held me against his body.

"Oh god," I muttered, knowing deep down what he was about to do to me.

"Oh whats wrong? Ya nervous? Here, let me help with that." He said as he grabbed my breast in his hand, squeezing it over and over and slowly pulling off my leotard.

"Please," I pleaded, "Please stop, plea…" I begged when I was cut off by another guy pulling me and spiky haired guy apart.

"Rico!" The second guy yelled, throwing him to the ground. "What the hell are you doing? We were told to capture her and deliver her to David a little beat up, nothing more, and nothing like," He stopped for a second. "Like this." He yelled as he pointed to me, lying on the ground, arms around my chest, covering myself.

"Oh come on, man," Rico/Spiky hair said, standing up. "I's was just having a little fun, I haven't been able to do anything for the past couple weeks being cooped up in that factory. There's no harm 'n a little fun."

"You call this fun?" He almost exploded, "What you're doing to that girl is not fun, it's sickening."

"You sure you aren't just jealous, I'll let you have a turn when I'm done with her if ya want." Rico said with a smirk, stepping towards me.

"Not another step, man, I'm taking her to David, you know how he gets when he doesn't get what he wants. Besides, he wouldn't want you to do anything like this to her, you know that. You don't want David to be pissed at you do you?"

This made Rico stop and think. "You're right, I don't want my throat ripped out, and besides, he said that not all of them would die so she'll probably live so I can do what I want with her when he's done doing whatever he's doing with them." He said like this was perfectly reasonable, like what he was going to do to me was perfectly fine.

With that Rico walked into the trees and vanished from sight as the second guy walked up to me and said:

"Sorry about Rico, lady, but I do have a job to do, and David's really pissed how long it's taking to capture you."

"Wha…?" I started to ask as he grabbed my head and slammed it into the tree behind me knocking me unconscious.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

I woke up, my mind groggy and pounding. I could feel myself being dragged across the floor, I had what felt like a bag over my head. I could smell and feel the dirt and grass under my body, I could also feel leaves, so I was still in the woods, but where am I, I thought.

I was dragged for a little bit when I could feel cold, hard concrete flooring below me, and heavy metal doors opening when all of a sudden I was blinded by light when the bag was pulled off my head.

"Put her to the left of Jake." A frightening, familiar voice said as I looked around the room, my eyes adjusting to the change in light. I heard voices around me but I couldn't think straight.

"Cassie! Is that you?" A warm, familiar voice said, from beside me. Marco?

"Cassie, what did he do to you?" An angry, vengeful voice, Rachel.

[Cassie, I hoped you had gotten away.] A soft, kind voice in my head, Tobias.

[Cassie, are you alright? Can you hear us?] A formal, stoic, soundless voice, Ax. [Prince Jake, you need to wake up, Cassie is here, she is unharmed.]

"Cassie?" A defeated, fearful voice, Jake?

My eyes finally adjusted to the light, I could see the others, all chained to large, wooden pillars like me, except Tobias who was in a small metal cage. I looked to my left where Marco stood, trying to fake a smile through the blood oozing out of his mouth to make me calm. Next to him was Ax who was propped up to the pillar, his front and back legs chained together with his arms chained to the pillar, his tail was snapped, broken and bloody, a large, sturdy sheath was wrapped around his tail blade. Next to him was Tobias in his cage, Tobias looked like roadkill, he was the worst looking out of all of us.

Next to Tobias was Rachel, she had a fire in her eye that sent shivers down my spine, she was furious and ready for revenge. Next to her stood a guy who was leaning against the pillar, with a bag over his head, seemingly unconscious. I looked to my right to see Jake, his face looking at the ground, his eyes vacant, distracted, with traces of disgust and hatred. I looked at him, trying to get him to notice that I was there. When Ax told him I was here he barely even blinked and continued to stare at the floor.

"Jake," I asked him in a gentle voice, "Are you okay?" I looked at him, worried, he didn't seem to know that I was there. "Jake?"

"Don't waste your time, Cassie," Rachel said, "he hasn't moved an inch or spoke more than your name since he got here."

[Actually,] Tobias corrected, [I was the first one here and he was talking until Marco got here.]

"So you're blaming me for Jake being like this?" Marco asked, acting hurt.

"Shut up, Marco, no one wants to hear you now." Rachel said back.

[Hold on, Rachel,] Tobias said, [Jake went silent when Marco got here and David whispered something in his ear. I think that whatever David said has made Jake this way.]

[What could David say to Prince Jake that would make him silent like this?] Ax asked, I could hear the worry in his voice, whatever David had said seemed to almost break him, he was a motionless zombie standing before us, completely unaware that we were talking about him, that we were even there.

"Well what did he say, Tobias?" Rachel asked.

[I don't know,] He admitted, [Normally I'd be able to hear just fine but my mind was still groggy so I didn't hear what he said, but they didn't talk for very long.]

Then from the corner of the room a door opened with David and several others walking out.

"If you wanna know what I told your oh so precious fearless leader then I'll just tell you. Why keep you all in the dark right?"

"How the hell are you here?" Rachel demanded, "What do you want?"

"Oh come on, Rachel," David mocked, "Even your pathetic little brain should be able to figure it out."

Rachel glared at him, he simply laughed, he had us beaten, he had taken all of us down, we were all chained to pillars, surrounded by several morph capable people, we were at his mercy.

"Isn't it obvious?" He went on, "I want revenge, for what you all did to me."

"And what?" Rachel shot back, "You couldn't do it yourself so you had to get people to do your dirty work."

"Actually, a friend of yours sent them to me to help me get my revenge."

"Who are you talking about, Visser Three?" Marco asked.

"That idiot, no way, I did what he couldn't do in almost five years in just a few days, I defeated the 'Andalite Bandits'."

"Then who?" I asked, trying to sound calm but my heart was pounding as my mind was already thinking of an answer, if the Ellimist is involved then there's only one person who could have done this.

"The Crayak, of course. Turns out he hates you as much as I do, so we struck a deal, that he would give me my ability to morph again and send me some guys to help me destroy you since he can't directly do anything to you."

"So what now?" Rachel asked, "You gonna kill us already or are we going to have to listen to you gloat and brag on and on?" Rachel was trying to sound calm, unafraid, but I could tell that she was as afraid as I was, she just was better at hiding it.

"Therein lies the best and worst part of this deal, The Ellimist would only let one of you die, but," He paused for effect, he was loving this. "Here's the best part, your so called fearless leader over there has to decide who dies, then he has to kill that person, only at that point will the others be allowed to go free." David said with a laugh and a smile, "That's why he hasn't said a word, I told him earlier and warned him that if he said anything that I'd kill all of you before his eyes."

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

To be continued. Next chapter should release within about a week.

Thanks for reading, if you like it or have any thoughts or comments please leave a comment.


	27. Chapter 27: Jake: Jake's Decision

Chapter 27: Jake: Jake's Decision

*** (Earlier that day) ***

David walked over to me and began to whisper in my ear;

"Alright, Jake," He started, "Here's the deal, Crayak and the Ellimist have come to an agreement, about Crayak's revenge, I mean. They agreed that because of the pain in the ass you've been to him that he can have revenge against you Animorphs. But the catch is that Crayak can't directly interfere, that's where I come in, he gave me my morphing ability back and a small group of morph capable humans in order to kill you. Unfortunately the Ellimist really likes you guys and says that you're too important to all be killed so he made an offer, that only one of you Animorphs shall after one of you dies I will let the others go free. That was the deal."

That practically stopped my heart, one of us would die, but who? Would he kill me for being the one who he blamed for everything? Or would it be Rachel for threatening his parents? I don't know. And the Ellimist, did he really allow this to happen? How could he do that after all that we've done for him and the Hork-Bajir? I couldn't think straight, my mind was racing. Oh, god, I thought, don't let him kill Cassie for being the one who planned to trap him in morph, I don't know what I'd do if she were to be killed.

David could see how this news shook me, I couldn't hide it. He loved seeing me like this.

"Do you wanna know the best part of all this is?" He asked with a grin on his face. "The best part is that _you_ have to decide who among you dies." My heart sank.

"And," he paused for dramatic effect. " _You_ have to be the one who kills whoever you decide."

My eyes fell to the floor, I couldn't believe what David was saying, I had to decide who died and kill them? How would I be able to look at any of my friends and condemn them to death by my hand? I know that David would force me to pick, but who would I pick?

"So here's what you're going to do, Jake, you're going to keep you're mouth shut about this to the others until I tell them, if you don't then I'll just kill them all in front of you right then. Do you understand me?

I couldn't fathom what was going on, I had to kill one of my closest friends, my mind was racing.

"Do you understand Jake?" David asked, a devilish grin on his face. "Do you know what I want?" He stepped back then smiled.

I couldn't think, I had to kill one of my friends. Who, I thought, who?

I looked at David, he wanted an answer, he looked impatient.

"Understood." I said, fully knowing that I had just agreed to kill one of my friends, I had a sickening feeling, I disgusted myself, I had just killed one of my friends.

************************************** (Later that day)

Tobias was here with me, so was Marco, Ax, and Rachel, Cassie was the only one of us still out there. Please, keep her safe, I thought aloud, not knowing who I was actually talking to, God? The Ellimist? Who knows.

The others had tried to talk to me when they first arrived, trying to be reassured by their leader that everything was going to be okay, that I had everything under control. But everything was not okay and I was not in control, the very opposite. So I remained silent, silent to their questions, silent to their concerns, silent to their begging, silent to their pleading and praying to say something. But I didn't say a word, I was too busy trying not to collapse from mental exhaustion, I was almost killed earlier today and have been chained to a pillar for almost twelve hours now, and on top of that I had to decide which one of my friends must be killed, by me. I thought it over, debated with myself on it for almost twelve hours straight without stopping. Weighing the pros and cons about killing each of my friends. Weighing the pros and cons, I thought. Makes me feel like a monster having to even think about that.

Who should I kill? I asked myself. My mind first jumped to Cassie, she is definitely out, I thought. I could never kill her, I would rather die than be without her, I know that we have confessed our love to each other before but I don't know if she knows how much I depend on her being there at the end of every mission, I _need_ her to be there. Cassie is my girlfriend, there is no way I'd kill her. Hold on, debated back, _that,_ is not a reason, is she really that valuable enough to keep around? What role does she actually play on the team? Yes she knows a lot about animals and lives with animals we can acquire but we could always research animals ourselves and go into the Gardens anyway without her. She isn't really that impor-. Stop it, I thought, Cassie is the world to me, she is my moral compass, while I sometimes disagree with her I always turn to her to know if what I'm doing is right or wrong. Without her we, no I, would be too reckless, we need our moral compass. So as of now Cassie is out, I thought. As of now? I asked myself, I sicken myself. Hold on, come up with the pros and cons of killing her, that's how you decided who you'd kill.

Pros? She's smart, kind, comforting, she knows when there is a problem and how to solve it. She always keeps her eye on what's right.

Cons? She's too kind, and caring. She does not like this war, she would rather not fight at all. From a tactical standpoint she isn't a good fighter, too timid and afraid to fight.

Marco? What about him, I asked myself. My best friend, we've been next to each other since we've been in diapers.

Pros, he is very intelligent, very cautious, and paranoid. He can out think anyone once he stops telling old, warn out stupid jokes and puts his mind to use.

However, I thought, he causes problems within the group, he gets on everyone's nerves everytime he opens his mouth. There is no way I'd be able to kill my best friend, Marco was a pain but he is my best friend.

What about Rachel? She is by far our best fighter, a mindless killing machine in battle, but outside of battle she's temperamental and honestly loves this war too much, she might not want the war to ever end. She's my cousin, how could I kill her? How would I tell her mom and sisters? That I, her cousin killed her. In fact, how could I tell any of their parents how they died? I couldn't mention David so how would I tell them that their child, whom they love more than the world, is dead?

How about Tobias? That made me almost cry inside, I had already ended his life once by letting him be trapped as a hawk, how could I kill him for real? He was our eye in the sky, our airforce, our lookout, our spy, my friend, my greatest failure, my fault for ruining his life. But, I thought, he doesn't have any family, any family that cares about him anyway, no one would notice if he were to die. But we would, I thought, especially Rachel. Oh god, Rachel, how would I be able to look her in the face and kill the love of her life? I have no idea. Is Tobias even important enough to let live? Yes he has his ability to morph again but he has the least morphs and experience fighting the Yeerks as the rest of us. Plus, he only fights in his hawk body, so he is our worst fighter. The war is reaching it's peak soon, we may need to stop our stealthy hit and run tactics and go on a full, all out assault on the Yeerks. Do we really need an eye in the sky for that?

Then what about Ax? He's the last one. Ax is our local expert on aliens and the Yeerks. Without him we would have all been killed years ago, but that's true about _all_ of them, everyone of them is important and irreplaceable. I was his Prince and he was my loyal soldier, he would follow any of my orders, even to the grave. Would he let me kill him if I said that it was the best and only way out? I don't know, but it sickens me to think that he might. That any of my friends would agree if I said that I had to kill one of them in order for the others to go free. How could I live with myself if I killed them? How could I face them after killing one of them? How would they think of me, their leader, their friend, that came up with the decision of who was not needed and replaceable?

I can't, I thought, I can't kill one of them, but I have to anyway. Who was replaceable? Who could the team live without? Our moral compass, my girlfriend and love of my life? Our tactician, my best friend? Our warrior, my cousin? Our spy, my failure? Our alien expert, my mindless soldier? Who is replaceable, who is not needed? Who could they live without?

How could I do this? How could I kill one of them? I have told myself from day one that if I ever got one of them killed then I'd quit as leader and leave the team. Now, as leader I have to kill one of them.

Then it hit me, I was perfect. Yes I am the leader but I never wanted to be and the others could decide among themselves what to do. They could even select a new leader, but who? Not Rachel, she's too violent, Marco's too paranoid and wouldn't have the respect of the others. Cassie is too kind, and I would never in a million years want to give her this burden of leadership. It feels like it has been slowly killing me since I've become the leader. Everyday I grow more tired, defeated, cold and lost, I could never do that to her. Ax is too rash when it comes to the Yeerks, he may do something foolish to hurt them. He is also an alien so he doesn't understand our culture enough. Plus, I don't think that he'd want to be leader if I were to die. Then what about Tobias? He's timid and shy, but he is also a fighter, a survivor, a predator. He may be the best one of them to take my place. I'll tell the others that he should be the new leader after me. The others, I thought, it almost made me collapse, how could I tell them my decision? They didn't even know what David's plan was yet, he hadn't told them anything yet. I'll have to convince them that I'm the one who must die, that they could go on without me and that we couldn't go on without one of them. I know they'd never go for that, especially Cassie and Marco, but in the end it's my decision, not theirs. How would they tell my parents? That I was just killed by some random guy in an alley or something? That it was just a case of being in the wrong place in the wrong time? How?

Then it's decided then, I thought outloud, you'll tell David that you are the one to die and kill yourself to let the others go free. It sounds so simple but at the same time not, it terrifies me to die, where would I even go, what would happen? Would I die and stand before God or the Ellimist? I have no idea, sometimes I can't even discern between the two. It doesn't matter, I thought, snapping my mind back to the task at hand, the only thing that matters is that the others will go free. If I die the so be it.

I was thinking how to tell the others my plan when someone said something that brought me back to reality for a split second;

"Put her next to Jake." It was David, his men were dragging Cassie in, chaining her to the pillar next to me. I didn't even flinch, I was only thinking how much this was going to hurt her, that I was going to kill myself to let her go free.

Then the sound of a familiar voice, it was Cassie, but she sounded far off, almost like I was somewhere else listening to faint thought speak. Before I realized it I could see the others from above, and myself. I could see the top of my own head, I was like a phantom watching from above. The me that was floating over the others did not have a body, nothing, I was just watching from above, but still standing on the floor. I looked around the air above me when I saw an old man with long, white hair, dressed in a grey robe. The Ellimist.

"I figured that it was you, either that or I'm just going crazy, bound to happen eventually I guess." I said this expecting to get a reply from him, but nothing came. He just stood there, I looked down, now I could see myself standing over the others, but they couldn't see me, was this all in my head or was The Ellimist really there?

Then he spoke;

{Jake, I see that David has told you what is going on.} It wasn't a question, it was a fact, he knew that I knew what was going to happen.

"Ellimist, isn't there some other way?" I begged, practically crying. "There has to be another way, you can't let this happen, you can't."

{I cannot interfere.}

"Then at least tell me what to do, you can do that can't you?"

{I can not. You must decide who among you must die. But be warned, to not trust David. Look to the person on your right with the covering on his head. That person is close to you. David has brought someone who is not an Animorph here, that person might change your mind because I have no power to save them because they were not in the deal.}

"Who is it?" I asked, knowing full well who it was.

{You know who it is.}

"Yes." I muttered.

{You must decide Jake, who among you seven Animorphs shall die.}

"Seven?" I asked, but before I could say another word I was back in my body.


	28. Chapter 28: Marco: Jake Reveals His Plan

Chapter 28: Marco: Jake Reveals His Plan

"So what now?" Rachel asked, "You gonna kill us already or are we going to have to listen to you gloat and brag on and on?"

David was glaring at Rachel, he always hated her the most out of all of us. And vice versa. She was trying to tick him off, a stupid idea, I mean the guy has us chained up and has a whole bunch of goons around us, ticking David off isn't a good idea.

"Therein lies the best and worst part of this deal, The Ellimist would only let one of you die, but," David took a dramatic pause, he was always about that sort of stuff, even more than me, I have to admit. That jerk. "Here's the best part, your so called fearless leader over there has to decide who dies, then he has to kill that person, only at that point will the others be allowed to go free." David said as he smirked at Jake,

"That's why he hasn't said a word, I told him earlier and warned him that if he said anything that I'd kill all of you before his eyes."

Jake had to choose one of us to kill to let the others go free? God, I thought, that's why he didn't say anything, I was trying to figure out why, I figured something like this was why. He'd never be silent like this otherwise, especially after Cassie tried using her cute voice on him, talking all silent and stuff. Didn't know that she talked like that.

"What?" Rachel demanded. "There's no way he'd agree to that."

"Actually, he's already agreed, he's known about this all day, he's going to do it, he has to. That's the deal Ellimist and Crayak made, one of you has to die in order for the rest to go free."

[Jake,] Tobias started. [There must be another way, you had to have thought of something.] We all turned to Jake but he didn't even look up, he was still staring at the floor, his eyes vacant.

[Jake,] Tobias continued. [Can you hear me? David told us, you can talk now.] Nothing, he didn't answer.

[Prince Jake?] Ax asked. [You must answer us, what shall we do about what David has said? Prince Jake? Are you alright?] Again, nothing. I looked at him, it looked like he was having a hard time breathing, like each breath took all his strength.

"Oh give it a rest," Rachel said with a sneer. "Jake's given up already, that's why he won't answer us."

"No," Cassie almost shouted. "Jake would never give up on us, he's probably thinking up a plan of what to do."

"What to do?" Now Rachel was almost shouting. "What he's going to _do_ is kill one of us, and look at him, he doesn't look like he even cares."

[How dare you say that about Prince Jake,] Now Ax was shouting. [Prince Jake cares about all of us, you must trust him.]

Rachel looked pissed, not that I can't see why, Jake wasn't even trying to say anything about what David said.

David looked around at all of us then back at Jake, grinning and trying not to break out laughing. "This is getting interesting, but I'm growing rather bored of your silence, Jake, you may talk to your little Animorphs and come to a decision. You have half an hour to make your decision and say your goodbyes, I'll be back then. And oh, Jake, make it interesting, I'm getting pretty bored over here".

With that David and his thugs left the room leaving us all silent and staring at Jake, expecting him to stand tall and tell us that everything was going to be okay, that he, our fearless leader found a way out, a way to escape, a way to take down David, something. But he never did. For the first few minutes he remained the same, staring off into space. The room remained silent, until Rachel started screaming at him of course.

"Jake!" Rachel screamed, completely pissed off, more than usual if you can believe it. "I'm getting fucking pissed off at you now, you better say something now or I swear that I'll morph to grizzly right now and go over there and kick your ass. Answer us!"

[I would not advice morphing,] Ax spoke up, trying to be helpful. [Marco has already tried, David's men beat him until he returned to his human form.]

"Oh shut up, Ax, you're not helping." Rachel was now turned to him, practically shaking with rage.

[Shut up, Rachel, don't get mad at Ax, he was just trying to help.] Tobias said to Rachel, she looked shocked, he just told her to shut up when she's ready to snap and kill someone. That takes balls.

"Just look at him, he doesn't even care." Rachel said again, not even addressing that Tobias told her to shut it. "We should be talking about this, coming up with a plan, not watching him stare at the floor. We have like what, ten minutes until David comes back in here to see who Jake kills and he hasn't said a word."

Ax spoke up again, [It has been twelve of your minutes, we have eighteen left.]

"Okay," Rachel said. "Eighteen minutes left, the time doesn't matter, he should be saying something.

Then from Jake came the sound of a deep breath, like he had just come up for air. We all turned to him. He rose his head, his eyes were bloodshot and lifeless but alert at the same time. Then he spoke;

"Cassie?" He turned to look at her, he was crying, not because he was happy to see her but because he was sad, almost looking scared, his body was shaking uncontrollably.

"What the hell, Jake?" Rachel again. "I've been yelling at you for the last minute and the first thing you say is Cassie?"

"Let him be," Cassie said, coming to his defense, it looks like he had a mental break down, his mind must be going crazy having to make this decision."

"Well I'd love to know what he decided, apparently he's had all day to think it over."

"Sorry." Jake said weakly, raising up his shoulders, standing up straight. "If you guys were saying anything then I couldn't hear you, I'm sorry."

"What do you mean you couldn't hear us?" Rachel was screaming again. "We all tried getting your attention, Tobias and Ax even tried thought speak, but nothing, you refused to say anything."

"Sorry," Jake said again, looking a little ashamed. "But I was talking to-" Rachel broke him off.

"Who the hell could you be talking to inside your head?"

"The Ellimist." Jake said flatly. We all stared at him. Jake began again, "I was talking to him, he told me what's going on, he said that he and Crayak made a deal where Crayak could kill us, but only one of us. It was later decided that I was the one who had to decide who died and that I'd have to kill that person, only then would he let the others go free."

[What are we going to do, Prince Jake, did you come up with a plan with the Ellimist to get us all out of here?]

Jake looked down again, looking disgusted at himself.

"We're going to break out of here and kick David's ass aren't we?" Rachel asked, clearly not happy that Jake was being silent again.

"Jake?" Now it was my turn. "What are we going to do? How are we going to break out of here?"

He looked up at us again, looking at all of us one by one before answering. "We aren't." He replied frankly.

"What do you mean?" I asked. "Come on buddy, don't go crazy on us now, we have to get out of here before one of us dies."

"I'm not joking, Marco." Jake rose his voice for the first time. "I spoke to the Ellimist, there is no other way out, you know how his deals work, one of us _has_ to die. Has to."

"Then we should talk about it, figure out what to do." Rachel said, calming down.

"Jake." Cassie said, speaking up for the first time in awhile. "Please, tell us, tell us what to do."

Jake remained silent for a few seconds, quietly cursing himself under his breath.

"I have decided," He began. "That none of you deserve to die and that I can not look any of you in the eye and murder you, so I have decided to kill myself so that you can all go free." He said this with no emotion at all.

[That's crazy, man, you shouldn't die for one of us.] Tobias said, moving to the corner of his cage.

"It's the only way for you all to live, I thought it over, you don't need me. This is the only way."

Cassie was bawling now, "You shouldn't say that, we do need you. We all need you, I," She stopped for a second, looking a little embarrassed. "I need you, I do. Jake, I love you, I can't let you kill yourself for us."

"Listen to her, Jake," I said frantically. "Dude. we all need you, you're our leader, we would have died years ago without you. Come on man, listen to me, I've known you for most of our lives, believe me, we need you."

"So what?" He asked. "Do you all just expect me to kill one of you so I can save myself."

"Yes!" I blurted out before I could stop myself. Jake's head fell again, I know how much that hurt him to hear that he should kill one of us to save himself. "I mean, we should at least talk about it."

"There is nothing to talk about, I can't ask one of you to die for me. I-" This time Ax broke him off.

[Prince Jake,] He started, trying very hard to stand up, one of his legs was facing the wrong way, I can't imagine how much pain he must be in standing up like that. [Allow me to die in your place, it would be an honor to die in the place of my Prince. You are far too important for us to lose, Prince Jake, just say the word and I will let you kill me.]

This shocked all of us, except Jake, he looked like he knew this was going to happen. Of course he did, I thought. He's Jake, he knows all of us better than we know ourselves, he must have come up with everything each one of us would say and a counter to each as well. That's just how his mind works.

Jake turned to look at Ax. "No, Ax, the others need you, you're our expert on the Yeerks, plus," He said dryly. "Do you really think the Andalites would come rescue us if you weren't the one to contact them. Would they risk coming to Earth just to save us?"

[Then let me die, Jake. So you can live, you guys don't need me anymore. You must've thought of it already, I'm a hawk, I'm not that useful in a fight, plus I don't have anyone out there who cares about me anyway, unlike you.] Rachel snapped her head to look at him.

"How can you say that, Tobias?" Rachel looked like she was going to cry, which she never does. "How can you say that you don't have anyone who cares about you? What am I to you? I love you, you know that. We all care about you."

[You know that's not what I meant, Rachel. I know that you love me, I'm just saying that compared to the rest of you I won't be missed as much. The only people who even know that I'm alive are you guys.]

"No." Jake said, looking at Tobias. "I would never let any of you die for me. David will be here any minute, we can't keep arguing this. I have decided, I'm going to die."

"Jake." Cassie said weakly.

"Listen to me, everyone." Jake began. "I only have a few minutes to say goodbye before David gets here. Ax, how much time do we have?"

Ax sunk back to the ground. [We have three minutes.]

"Not much time, then I'll make this quick." He looked at each one of us. Then he began.

"Marco, you're my best friend, we've known each other forever, I, I…" He trailed off. "Sorry, I'm not good at this sort of thing. Tell my parents that I was killed by a random stranger, nothing can't know about David, especially Tom. Take care of my family and Cassie for me. You two mean the world to me, I'm sorry. Marco, after, after all of this go in my room and grab th-." I broke him off.

"I know, the red folder. You can trust me, I'll take care of it."

"What red folder?" Rachel asked, her eyebrow raised. "From the way you two are talking it sounds like your secret magazine stash." She was trying to take some tension out of the air, it didn't work.

Jake chuckled, "No, it's my last will and testimony, so to speak. Along with letters for the each of you and my parents. I wrote them years ago just in case the Yeerks managed to kill us or me one of these days." As Jake said this the realization struck the whole team at once. All of our hearts sunk.

"Tobias," Jake began again. "I'm sorry for ruining your life, everything is my fault, I just want to to know that I'm sorry. I'm sorr-"

[Don't apologize, Jake.] Tobias said, interrupting him. [I don't blame you for me being a hawk, it's my own fault, and something I have to live with for the last of my life.] Rachel looked at Tobias with tear-filled eyes.

"Ax?"

[Yes, Prince Jake?]

Jake smiled for a brief second. "How many times have I told you to not call me 'prince'?"

[More times than I can count, my Prince.]

"Well, Ax, I don't know exactly how I'm supposed to do this, but as of now I am no longer your Prince, in a few minutes I'll die, as of now you no longer have to follow my orders or call me 'prince'."

Ax's face showed more emotion than I've ever seen before. [You will always be my Prince. After we have defeated the Yeerks I will make sure to have you made a full Prince. I will make sure your sacrifice will be remembered by all the free races across the galaxy for generations to come, for you are a hero who should be honored by all.]

"I don't want to be remembered, Ax. I'm no hero."

[You _are_ a hero, Prince Jake, you are a great hero who should be remembered by everyone on your planet.]

"No, you're wrong, I'm no hero. I could never be a hero after all the things I've done. I've killed to many to be considered a hero."

"Pardon my french," I blurted out. "But bullshit. Jake, we are all to blame for what we have done, not just you. We are as guilty as you."

"But who will the world blame for all the death we've caused, me, not you. I'm your leader, and as leader I take responsibility for everything we have done."

I stopped arguing, we only had a minute left. Jake turned to Rachel. "Rachel I need you to promise me something."

Rachel looked like she was struggling not to burst out crying. "Whatever you need, Jake, anything you say."

"Promise me that you will protect the others, you are our warrior, they will need you. Protect Cassie for me, don't let anything happen to her. And promise me that you will not do anything too extreme to David when this is over. Promise me that."

"I'll try." Rachel couldn't hold it back anymore, she was crying her eyes out. So was I, Tobias and Ax can't cry but I knew that they were crying inside. As for Cassie, she looked like she was going to fall over, crying and shaking on the floor. I've known Jake the longest besides Rachel of course but I can't imagine what Cassie's going through right now, they love each other, and they just got enough guts to tell each other not too long ago. I know that she will never get over this.

Jake turned from Rachel to the unknown person besides him to Cassie. "Cassie, I know that you don't agree with my decision, that any of you do for that matter but it's the only way. Cassie, I wish I had hours to tell you how much I love you, not just a minute. Words cannot express how much I love you. I'm just sorry that it took me so long to tell you how I felt." Jake stretched out his hand as far as the chain would allow, Cassie did the same, they just managed to hold hands. We all stood there as Cassie reached her hand to me, I took it and reached to Ax, he held it and placed his other hand on Tobias' cage, as did Rachel, she looked at the unknown, unconscious person to her left.

"Take his hand," Jake said as he grabbed the stranger's hand. "You will find out who that is when David gets here."

We all stood in the circle holding each other's hands until David returned.

"Ah," He said, making a fake cutesy reaction. "Isn't that sweet? Their holding hands." He broke apart Jake and Cassie's hand and walked to the center of the room.

"Your time is up, Jake, now tell me, who's gonna die?"

Jake looked to the stranger on his right. "First remove the bag over his head, I want to see my brother before I die."


	29. Chapter 29: Jake: No Reason To Live

Chapter 29: Jake: No Reason To Live

I looked from David to the person on my right and said;

"First remove the bag over his head, I want to see my brother before I die."

David looked shocked, so did the others, obviously they didn't guess who else was here. It seemed simple to me.

"Your brother? What do you mean?" Marco asked, frantic.

"David, why is Tom here? He has nothing to do with this." Rachel demanded.

David remained silent for a second, then smirked. "Of course you figured out who it was, Jake. But tell me, how'd you figure it out, surely The Ellimist didn't tell you, he's not allowed to intervene."

The others looked at me. "He didn't tell me who it was, I figured it out myself. You see, I figured you out, David."

"Oh did you?" He asked. "I doubt that."

"What did you figure out Jake?" Cassie asked.

"What are you talking about?" Rachel demanded. "There's nothing to figure out, he just wants us dead."

"You're half right, Rachel. He does want us dead but only one of us can die, but more importantly he wants to beat me."

"What do you mean beat you?" Rachel asked. "He already beat us."

"I mean that doesn't just want to kill me, no, he wants to destroy me, see, he blames me for ruining his life, more than the Yeerks, more than Visser Three. He doesn't just want me hurt, he wants me defeated, by having to kill one of you in cold blood by my own hand. That," I said, standing tall and looking David in the eye. "Is what he wants, he wants to destroy me."

The others all stared, silent, not knowing what to say, but knowing that I was right. "Isn't that right, David?" I asked.

David just glared at me, if looks could kill, I thought.

"Don't think that you're smart for figuring that out, it was pretty obvious." He said, walking in a small circle inside the pillars where we stood. "I mean, why else would I go through all this trouble of catching all of you? And the idea of making you kill one of them was my idea, by the way. When Crayak heard my idea, oh man, you should've seen the look on his face, not that he really has a face, but he was ecstatic."

"You sick monster! This is all you're fault!" Rachel screamed, trying as hard as she could to break free from the chains and run at David.

Whhhaaammm! Two men rushed over and began beating her with bats and fists. "Aaahhhh!" She cried out in pain. She collapsed, a small pool of blood forming around her.

[Rachel!] Tobias yelled in our heads, almost deafening.

David looked to me, enjoying seeing me flinch every time Rachel was struck.

"Stop." I pleaded. "Leave her alone, I've made my decision." This got his attention.

David held up a hand and the two stepped back, leaving Rachel lying on the floor, blood gushing from her mouth, covered in bruises and marks. She opened her eyes, looking at me, the look sent shivers down my spine. It was helplessness and despair.

"Now, was that so hard, Jake? Is it really worth your friends being beaten? Just tell me who dies and you can all go free. Besides whoever dies, of course." He said with a laugh. He was loving this.

I looked from him to the others, then to my brother besides me.

"You heard me," I said, gathering up all my strength for what was going to happen. "Uncover his face, I want to see my brother before I die. Wake him up so I can talk to him."

"Don't think you can order me around, Jake. The days of me taking orders from you like a little soldier are over. I was planning on showing you him anyway, why else would I have gone through the trouble of bringing him here?" He pointed to Tom. "Boys."

He said and two guys walked over to Tom and removed the bag from his head. I could see that he was actually awake, but his mouth was covered by duct tape so that he couldn't talk. Tom blinked as his eyes adjusted to the light and let out a sound of pain as the tape was ripped of his face. He looked around at all of us, shock on his face. He looked from me to the others in the circle, practically freaking out when he saw Ax in his Andalite form lying on the floor. "An Andalite? What is going on?" Tom's face immediately froze as he realized that he let the word 'Andalite' slip around all of us, who he thought were just his little brother and his friends.

He looked to me. "Jake? What's going on here? Are you okay? Why are your friends here, and that, that alien looking thing over there on the floor." He looked around at all of us again, completely confused, trying to figure out what was going on. "Cassie?" He asked. "Rachel, and Marco too, and an alien and a thing in a cage?" I could see him focusing on Tobias, trying to see what he was. "A bird? What in the world is going on?" He asked me.

Before I could say anything David stepped in front of him. "Now now, Yeerk, haven't you at least began to figure it out?" Tom looked shocked, at least the Yeerk in his head was shocked, he thought David was dead. "Oh come on, Yeerk." David continued. "Use that parasitic brain of yours and begin to think. Your little brother and friends are here with an Andalite, who you of course recognize, and that little birdie in the cage, who you've seen for years, don't tell me you can't figure it out."

"What are you talking about?" Tom asked, trying to not look like a nervous wreck, he didn't want to show us that what David was saying ws true.

"Enough of the games, Yeerk. Don't try to hide it anymore, it's useless. Jake and the others already know what you are. They've known for years."

Shut up, David, I thought. He was blowing our cover to my brother, even if we got out of here the Yeerk in his head would know that we were the 'Andalite Bandits'.

Tom looked even more shocked. "How? How do they know?"

"Oh come on, you stupid Yeerk. Figure it out. Take a closer look, look at the Andalite and the hawk, and count how many of Jake's friends are here. There are six of them total, and how many of your so-called 'Andalite Bandits' are there?"

That's it, we were dead, Tom knew all about us. I could see the shock leave his face and be replaced by a face of hatred and anger.

"David," Tom asked. "You mean to tell me that my little brother and his friends are the Andalite Bandits?"

"Of course I do. They've been fighting against you Yeerks for four years now. Every single setback was caused by them, by him." David said as he pointed to me.

"What do you mean that all of this was caused by Jake? He's just an ordinary human."

"He may be a human but he's definitely not ordinary. He and his friends were given the ability to morph by Elfangor years ago and have been fighting you since. I mean, come on, it was pretty obvious."

Tom looked at me, his face filled with so many emotions at once, mostly confusion and utter hatred.

"Tell me, Jake." Tom asked me, with hate on his tongue. "You're the tiger, aren't you? You're their leader right? Visser three always thought that the 'Andalite Bandit' in the tiger morph was the leader."

I just stood there, unable to speak, my mind racing, all I wanted to do was talk to my brother before I died, not his Yeerk. Now thanks to David Tom's Yeerk knew all about us.

"Jake!" He yelled. "Answer me, are you fighting with the Andalites?"

"I am, we all are." I answered him back.

"So David,"Tom said, turning his head towards him. "Why am I here? We all thought that the so-called Andalites had killed you to keep you quiet after we didn't see you for awhile after we infested your parents."

"Why don't you ask your brother and his friends, they're the ones who got rid of me by trapping me as a rat. But now I'm back. And for why you're here, that's pretty simple, you're here because out of every single person on this planet he cares about you the most, even more then his little girlfriend over there. You see, I'm here to destroy him, he's going to have to kill one of his friends in order to free the others."

"But why am I here? I'm not with the Andalites? When Visser Three hears about this he's gonna send an entire army of Hork-Bajir after you to-"

"Oh shut up, Yeerk. You're giving me a headache. How are you this stupid? Of course I'm not going to just let you go, I'm gonna make Jake kill you after one of his friends." My heart sank, I figured that something like this was going to happen but to hear it myself, it nearly destroyed me.

"That wasn't in the Ellimist's deal, you can't do that." Rachel screamed.

"Actually I can, Xena." David mocked. "The only condition was that only one of you Animorphs could die, he didn't say anything about normal people or Yeerks. I can kill whoever I want as long as they aren't one of you."

I looked to Cassie besides me and took her hand again, she started to cry again, she knew what I was going to say.

"Enough of your monologuing, David." I paused, mouthing the words 'I love you' to Cassie. "I've made my decision, I've decided who's going to die."

David smirked. "Good, it's about time, I was getting pretty bored watching you all cry and hold hands. So tell me, Jake, who's gonna die?"

"May I ask for one thing first?" David's smirk left his face, it was replaced by a questioning look.

"You mean a last request? I don't see why not, as long as you keep it brief, I have a hot date tonight."

"Yeah right." Rachel whispered under her breath loud enough for David to hear.

"At least I'm not dating a bird, Rachel." He shot back. "So Jake, what do you want from me?"

"I actually want something from Tom, not you."

"What could you possibly want from the Yeerk? He's chained up just like you." Than David's face lit up. "Oh, I get it, but have fun convincing the Yeerk to go along with it."

Tom looked at me. "What do you want, Andalite loving scum? I suppose that you want to talk to your oh so precious brother, don't you?"

"I do, it's not much to ask, think about it. You're going to die anyway, might as well let Tom talk to me so he quits screaming in your head for a few minutes."

He looked shocked. "How did you know that he is screaming?"

"Oh, please." I said. "I was a Yeerk once, years ago, when this all started. I was stuck, tied to a chair for three days by my friends in order to starve the Yeerk. So believe me, I know that Tom is screaming inside you head. It's probably getting hard to concentrate with all that noise, isn't it?"

"You were a controller once? Good, serves you right for getting in the way of the glorious Yeerk Empire."

"So are you going to let me talk to him or not?" I asked.

The Yeerk burst out laughing. "Oh course not, you think that I'd be nice and do that for you? You humans are truly stupid."

"Well then." David said, stepping in front of me again. "If he's not gonna let you talk to Tom then let's get this over with. Oh Jake, I bet that I can guess what's going through your head right now."

"And what's that?"

"You're wishing that you never made me one of your little Animorphs, aren't you? You know, making me the seventh Animorph was the worst decision you ever made, it ruined all our lives."

"Seventh?" I asked in a whisper, my mind imploding, I had just figured out what the Ellimist had hinted at, I was too busy earlier to figure it out. But now I had him, I had David. The Ellimist wanted us to win, but he couldn't tell me outright what to do, so he gave me a hint. I thought for a few seconds, but the biggest question was how I was going to pull it off.

"Yeah, seventh." David asked with a mocking voice. "What, you too stupid to count to seven? I'm the seventh Animorph. Jeez, Jake, how are you so stupid?" He ended with a laugh.

I turned to Cassie for a second and squeezed her hand and gave a look that said 'trust me'. I was worried that she wasn't going to catch it but her tears and silent cries slowly stopped as she watched me. She got the message, that's my girl. I didn't want her to worry.

"You're right, David." I said as I stood tall in front of him, my friends all looked to me, worried, all except Cassie, about what was going to happen. "You're an Animorph, just like us, and since I have to kill an Animorph, I have decided to kill you so that we can _all_ go free."

David froze, he didn't expect this, he thought that he had me beat. My friends all looked at me, faces mixed with worry and happiness.

"Can you do that?" Rachel asked, through tear-filled eyes.

"Jake," Marco asked. "Why didn't you tell us that this was your plan, we were all worried that you were going to die."

[Marco's right, Jake, you should've told us?] Tobias said from inside his cage.

"Jake," Cassie now. "Are you sure that this will work? What if the Ellimist didn't count David as on-" David broke her off, his face was red with rage.

"Of course that won't work!" He screamed, getting in my face. "The Ellimist isn't here, I am, I'm in charge here, what I say goes. And since you decided to refuse to kill one your friends, I'm going to kill all of them, right here, right now." David said this as he was just inches from my face. A big mistake, yes I was chained to this pillar but I still had good movement of my arms. I could end this madness now with my own hands.

"Boys!" He yelled to the guys around us. "Kill them all, but leave Jake for la-" He stopped as I let go of Cassie's hand and grabbed David by the neck, using all the strength I had left to crush his windpipe and end this nightmare.

He was in shock for just a few seconds, just enough for me to dig my thumbs into his windpipe, causing him to choke.

Whhhaaammm! "Aahhhhhh!" I screamed in pain, some of David's guys started beating me and pulling him back. "No!" I yelled, as they pulled David aside, just a few more seconds and he would've been dead and this would've all been over.

The guys stopped beating me as David raised his hand, coughing up blood.

"That was a nice try, Jake. I gotta give you credit, I didn't see it coming. You know, with your stupid no killing humans policy. Didn't think you'd have the balls." He rubbed his neck and looked at the others. "Can you guys believe that, he just tried to kill me? Jeez, and here I thought that he didn't have it in him."

"Oh don't flatter yourself, David." Rachel said. "I'd kill you myself if I had the chance, we all would."

"While I believe you, Xena, I don't think Cassie, Marco nor Tobias over there could do it, given the chance. There just must be something about your family about not caring about how many people you kill. You must all be blood-thirsty savages, I bet."

[Guess again, David. I'm a hawk, I kill for a living, you're nothing more than a mouse to me, or a rat, in your case.]

"I see why you like him, Rachel." David said with a laugh. "He's a killer just like you. This is gonna be fun, killing all of you as you beg for mercy, especially you, Rachel. But which morph should I use? Lion just for good measure? How about cobra so I can see you slowly die from the poison? Or should i just do it myself, and kill you with my own hands?"

"Leave her alone, David." I yelled. "If it's a fight you want then unchain me, we can finish that fight we started years ago in the mall."

"Oh Jake, Jake Jake Jake Jake, you don't think I'd be so stupid as to let you free so you could morph do you? As tempting as it would be I'd rather kill you myself, but first let's start with your friends, shall we?" He motioned to a few of his guys and pointed to Tom and Cassie. "Let's start with his little girlfriend and Yeerk-infested brother. Unchain them and put them on the floor in front of him."

"No!" I screamed as I watched two guys throw Cassie and Tom to the floor. "Cassie! Tom!"

"Screaming won't save them now, Jake, you had your chance, but you blew it."

He grabbed a bat from one of the guys and stood over Cassie. "This could've all been avoided, Jake, their deaths are on you, remember that." He took a breath as he raised the bat over his head. Cassie was screaming for her life, lying helplessly on the floor, her hands and feet bound together by a new chain.

"Cassie!" I screamed, heart filled with rage and sadness as I watched David swing the bat down, it fell in what seemed like slow motion, the bat falling from the sky as it impacted her head, and her head snapping back, hitting to floor beneath her.

Whhhaaammm! "Aaahhhh!" She cried out in pain as the next few blows hit her head, until after the fourth blow when she went silent and limp. For what seemed like hours I watched David savagely beat Cassie, even after she stopped moving. I was screaming at David, every single word I could imagine, screaming that I would kill him with my own hands. Rachel was crying for her friend and threatening his life as well.

Marco was trying not to gag as Cassie's head was split open and her brain was exposed, spewing out blood like an overflowing river. Ax was begging for David to stop and to kill him instead and to let us go free. Tobias was silently ripping out the metal rod in his leg with his beak in order to be able to morph and escape. Tom just laid there, like a statue, his mind blank, thinking about how this was going to be him. And David, he was smiling, and laughing as he beat her, even after death. He kept looking at me and saying that it was my fault.

After what seemed like an eternity David moved from Cassie to Tom. Wiping Cassie's blood from his face with his sleeve. David beat Tom just as brutally, and after a few hits to the head from his bat Tom went silent and still as well.

David stopped after a while, leaning on the bat to catch his breath. He was smiling, laughing, giggling like a little schoolgirl talking about a crush. His men all just stared, some were gagging like Marco, trying not to puke, I bet that none of them had expected this, this type of savagery. The others screamed around me as I went silent, my life was over, they were both dead. My will to live was gone, only hatred remained. With the last of my strength I began to pull on my chains, attempting to break free. The guy next to me stood watching David, he held a knife, but he was distracted, too much to notice me breaking from my chains.

With one final pull I yanked my hands from the chains, grabbing the knife from the guys hand and ran for David.

He was too busy laughing to notice me until I was inches from him, too late, too late to run or hit me with the bat.

"You killed her!" I screamed, as I put all my weight behind my arm as I stabbed him through his chest, I was aiming for his heart but I missed. "You killed him!" I screamed as I twisted the blade, snapping it, leaving most of the blade inside his body.

"You killed them! Now it's your turn!" David stared, eyes as big as dinner plates, knowing that he was going to die. From the corner of my eye I could see Marco yelling 'No'. But I didn't care, I wanted him dead. David fell to his knees as some of his guys ran out of the room, trying to escape my wrath. I stood next to him, as he looked up to me and smiled through blood stained teeth. His smile disgusted me, made me furious beyond belief. "You killed them." I spoke softly. "You finally did it, you got what you wanted, you finally broke me." He smirked as I placed my hands around his neck once again, in one final moment I jerked my hands, snapping his neck, killing him, finally ending this vile nightmare. I stood there for a few seconds, catching my breath. I looked at his face, it sickened me, I pushed him back onto the floor. I kneeled down to where Cassie lyed. "Cassie…" I cried, screaming. "Ellimist! I know you can hear me! You told me to pick David, I did, so why is she dead? Is this what you wanted? To see me broken? To see me beaten? To see me destroyed?" I sat on the floor and pulled her disfigured body onto my lap, holding her beaten and bruised face, crying. "Is this what you wanted, Ellimist? Were the others right, am I too valuable to die? Is this why you didn't want me to die, because I'm too important to you? Then what about her?! Is she not important enough to live? I did it, I killed David for you, so why did she die?" I paused, catching my breath. The others were all in shock, they just all watched me. Rachel cried as Marco and Ax tried to talk to me, I wasn't listening to what they were saying. Tobias removed the metal rod from his leg and was morphing something to escape the cage.

She's dead. I killed her. She died because of me. These thoughts filled my head and swirled around and around for what seemed like an eternity.

I held her with one hand as the other picked up the broken, blood-stained knife. I moved it around in my hand, my escape from the pain was right there, I could finally be rid of all this, this anger, sorrow and darkness that I felt. The others were unable to stop me, they were all still chained up, besides Tobias, but he was halfway in morph so he couldn't stop me either. My friends watched me as I looked at the blade and smiled, it was Marco who figured out what I was going to do and spoke up first.

"Jake." He spoke softly, calmly, but I could hear the emotion and worry in his voice as he spoke. "Put the knife down, that's not going to help anything. Believe me. Just calm down and help us out of here so we can get her to a hospital."

"A hospital? A hospital!?" I asked, my voice rising, anger flowing again. "What good will a hospital do? She's dead Marco, I killed her."

"Jake, it's not your fault, David is the one who killed her, not you. So please, please put the knife down, before you do something stupid."

Rachel looked to Marco. "What are you talking about? What's he doing? His back is to me, I can't' see anything."

"He's holding the knife and smiling, I know exactly what he's going to do." Then to me he said. "Jake, please, put it down, throw it over to the side of the room, just so that you can't see it."

"You mean he's…" Rachel stopped, I could hear the realization in her voice. "Jake! Stop, listen to Marco, just put it down."

[I do not understand,] Ax said, moving his body to see Marco and Rachel. [What is Prince Jake going to do? Why are you two so worried?] Neither of them answered him.

"Why should I?" I asked them, all emotion washed from my voice. "She was my world, I have nothing without her. And Tom…, he's gone too. I loved her, I killed her, I loved her and I killed her. I killed him too, both of them. I killed them, I killed them, I killed them." I repeated this several times until Rachel cut in.

"Tobias, hurry up and finish demorphing. You need to stop Jake."

[I'm going as fast as I can, but I'll have to morph human to be able to stop him, as a hawk I can't do anything.]

I heard these voices, but they seemed far away, they grew quieter with every passing second, until I could barely hear them anymore.

I looked again to the knife, my escape from this pain, and placed it's broken blade onto my cold neck, my mind preparing myself for what was going to come, when I heard the voices of my friends rise again.

"Jake," Marco screamed. "Please, stop! You can't do this, we need you. Please," He begged. "Don't do this, you know that Cassie wouldn't of wanted this." Marco's words stopped me, Cassie, I knew that he was right but I couldn't stand the pain. I needed to escape.

"What she would've wanted was to have lived." I answered coldly. "Besides, she's dead, soon I can be with her once again."

[Jake, man. Please think.] Tobias was almost completely hawk now, he still needed to morph human. [Think about your parents, they shouldn't have to lose _both_ of their sons in one day.]

[Prince Jake.] Ax now, he must have figured out what was happening enough to say something. [Please, you must come to your senses, what you are doing will not solve anything. You must know that.]

Voices. All of these voices in my head all at once, but I wasn't listening. All pleading, all worried, all except one, one of them was filled with anger and rage, Rachel's voice.

"Jake! Listen to me! Jake, Jake! Fucking listen to me now, you coward, this won't solve anything, you know it!" Her words were filled with so much anger, it surprised me.

[Rachel,] Tobias said, frantic. [That's not helping, we need to calm him down, not insult him.]

"No." She replied. "He needs to hear this. Jake, the only reason why you're doing this is because you're too much of a coward to live with what happened. Tom's my cousin and Cassie's my best friend, but you don't see myself trying to kill myself, I'm sad and furious too but that won't help anything, you coward."

"A coward?" I asked, calmly, all emotion stripped from my voice. "Rachel, I've been a coward since that night in the construction site when we met Elfangor. We have been fighting this war for over four years now, I'm tired. Rachel, I'm tired of this war, I'm tired of ordering my friends to their death every mission. I've always said to myself from day one that the day that I let one of you die is the day that I quit…, but now with my brother and girlfriend dead…, I…, I can't live like that, knowing that I killed them. You all knew that my plan was for me to kill myself to let you all go free, I should have just killed myself when David asked and she would still be alive. My death now changes nothing, I was going to die anyway."

Rachel was silent as Marco tried to talk me out of it. Ax begged for me to stop, saying that this was not the way a great Prince should die. But I didn't care, my life was over already with Cassie gone. I saw Tobias, he was nearly human, enough to start to stand and move towards me, but his lower body was still that of a hawk, it would change last.

I looked to Marco as I placed the blade against my throat again. "Tell Cassie's and my parents that I'm sorry. I'm sorry for killing their child. I…, I just can't live without her." I looked down to Cassie's lifeless body and kissed her on the forehead one last time as I closed my eyes and started pressing the blade against my throat as it drew blood. I was just mere seconds from being able to escape my pain when someone grabbed my arm, preventing me from slicing my neck. I expected it to be Tobias, how dare he stop me from being able to see Cassie again.

I opened my eyes, I was filled with shock. It wasn't Tobias who stopped me, but Cassie. I looked down to her, she was still in my lap but her wounds and blood were gone, she looked at me with eyes filled with sorrow and sadness. I just stared at her as she took the knife from my hand and threw it aside, reaching up and touching my face with the other.

"Jake," She spoke, her voice like an angel, soft and gentle, sweet and kind, filling my heart with joy once again. "I can't live without you either." I just sat there, mouth open in disbelief.

"Is…, Is that really you?" I asked, body frozen. "Cassie, is that really you?"

"Of course it is, here." She said calmly, grabbing my hand that once held the blade. "Feel my skin, feel that I am here with you." She brought my hand to her face and touched my hand to it. It nearly made me fall over. The sensation of feeling her body alive once again, it made me cry.

I pulled her to me as I cried in her arms as she hugged me and comforted me and assured me that everything was going to be alright. I felt like a baby in his mother's arms, crying as she rocked him to sleep.

Tobias stood a few feet from us, giving us space, fully human. He then started to free the others. As they were freed they all rushed over to me, crying over me like a child. I closed my eyes once again and became lost in the sound of Cassie's voice as she comforted me.

I looked to Cassie, tears still pouring from my eyes. "How, how are you alive? I killed you?"

"The Ellimist, he told me that since the deal was that you had to kill one of us that anyone of us killed by David would be brought back." Just as she said this he appeared.

{CASSIE IS CORRECT. THE DEAL WAS THAT THE ONLY OF OF YOU THAT COULD DIE HAD TO DIE BY JAKE. AND SINCE CASSIE WAS KILLED BY DAVID I THE DEAL WAS BROKEN AND I WAS ALLOWED TO BRING HER BACK.}

I looked from Cassie to my brother's lifeless body. "But what about Tom? Can't you bring him back as well?"

{I UNFORTUNATELY CANNOT. THERE WERE NO CONDITIONS IN OUR DEAL ABOUT OTHER HUMANS OR YEERKS. I CANNOT BRING HIM BACK. I AM SORRY.}

My heart sank as I looked at my brother's body. As soon as he appeared, the Ellimist left, leaving us alone. The others let me cry and scream for my brother for awhile until they decided that I needed to go to the hospital. Marco said that it would be risky, and that I should just morph and demorph to be healed, but I refused, saying that I couldn't. Eventually they decided to take Tom and I to the hospital, I watched Rachel, Ax and Tobias in human morph carry Tom away as Marco and Cassie helped me to my feet and walk through the forest to the hospital.

Sorry about the sorta long wait with the chapter upload, been busy with work and sleeping.

This was the most gruesome/violent/deep chapter I've ever written, it's also one of my favorites. So let me know if you guys want more serious and deep emotional stuff like this in the future.

I am sorry to say but there are only a handful of chapters left in this story, but have no fear, for I have plans for a sequel to this story already planned out. The first few chapters should go up by New Years(may be changed), I just have to write them out. In the meantime while you're waiting for chapters to be uploaded or for the sequel to come out I'll hopefully be uploading some short one-shots. They will range from serious, like this story to full blown comedies. Just leave some ideas or any feedback you have, I take all constructive criticism.

But enough of my babbling, the next chapter should come out within a week, not more than a week like this one. Thanks for reading, please leave a review and comment.

Hephaestus


	30. Chapter 30: Cassie: The Slap

Chapter 30: Cassie: The Slap

It's been a few hours since we left the factory where David had kept us. In the meantime we managed to carry Tom and Jake from the woods. We were also able to flag down an ambulance on the way to the hospital.

At first Jake refused to be taken to the hospital, he didn't want anyone to know what had happened, just in case any Controllers found out about David. But the Ellimist had taken care of David and his men, he hid his identity from the public.

At first the paramedics didn't want to take us with them as they took Jake and Tom to the hospital, but when Rachel told them that she was their cousin, that I was Jake's girlfriend and that we were all friends they reluctantly agreed to take us with them. On the way the paramedics confirmed what we were all too ashamed to admit, that Tom was dead, and there was nothing that we could do for him. When Jake heard this news he lashed out frantically from his stretcher, the paramedics had to strap him down so that he didn't hurt anyone. The ride to the hospital seemed to take forever, I held Jake's hand the whole way as the paramedic worked on him, while the others just watched Jake as he broke out into spontaneous fits of rage and sadness, switching from blind fits of rage to uncontrollable crying. Finally the paramedics had no choice but to sedate him until they got to the hospital.

At the hospital the doctors rushed Jake to the emergency room, leaving the rest of us in the lobby to be questioned by the police. Luckily we had already decided on a story before we had left the woods. It was a stretch but it was all we had.

When the police had questioned us what happened Rachel spoke up, and took care of all the talking. We had decided that I was the one who should of told them because I was the most convincing, but when they first started talking to us I couldn't keep myself from crying long enough to talk, so Rachel being the good friend that she is took the job of telling the police what happened.

She told them that Jake and Tom were attacked by some random stranger's and dragged into an alley and robbed at knife point. And that they had attempted to fight them off but they were outnumbered and beaten, and that Tom was beat to death. Rachel told the police that we happened to be walking by when we saw Jake carrying Tom beaten and bloody down the street, and that we rushed to help them to the hospital. Rachel explained that we never saw who had attacked them, and that we didn't know where they had been attacked either, and that Jake told us what happened, saying that he fought them off in order to get away. We were all worried that someone would find David's body in that factory, but luckily for us The Ellimist took care of it, he moved David to a secluded alleyway just as Jake said, he also hid his identity from the police and paramedics that found him. The police were more than shocked to hear that Jake had killed one of the attackers in self defense, one of the officers was skeptical about whether or not it was self defense or revenge but the police chief said that it didn't matter, and that no one was going to press charges on Jake.

Within an hour most of our parents had arrived at the hospital. All except Jake's who had been out of town and were on their way back. Luckily for Marco we were taken to the same hospital that his father was in, so Marco spent most of his time with him.

All of our parents were all worried beyond belief when they met us at the hospital, which is to be expected, since they had just learned that we were at the hospital with Jake and Tom. We worried about Tobias and Ax though, since that they had no parents to call, when the police officers asked them for their parents numbers I started to worry that they would realize that they didn't have any parents. But Tobias handled it and told them Erik the Chee's dad's number. Erik's dad covered as their father for them.

My parents rushed to see me when they arrived, I spotted them as they walked through the door, I could barely stop myself from screaming and crying like a baby as I ran into my parents arms. My mom tried to comfort me as my dad spoke to the doctors about Jake.

At eleven the doctors told us that they had Jake stable, and that he was awake. We all demanded to see him but the doctors refused, saying that only adult family members were allowed to see him. And since none of us fit that criteria only Rachel's mom was allowed to see him since she was his aunt and since his parents had left her in charge of talking to the doctors while they were on their way to the hospital.

Rachel's mom was only in Jake's room for a few minutes but when she came back she was shaken, looking in shock. We all asked how Jake was doing but all she said was that he was 'okay', nothing more, nothing less.

Around midnight Jake's parents arrived, I felt terrible for them, they had just been told that one of their sons had just been killed and that the other had killed his attacker, I can't even begin to imagine what was going through their minds. Jake's mom rushed over to me, crying, she wanted to know if I was okay, that shocked me at first. One of her sons had died and the other was in the ER and she was worried about me. I asked why she was worried about me, she answered quickly that she and her husband considered me one of their children, since Jake and I have known each other for years. It was at that moment that I realized how much everyone was worried about me because I was his girlfriend. Whenever a nurse, doctor, paramedic or police officer heard that I was his girlfriend they worried for me and treated like I was one of the ones who was attacked. Jake's mom brought me aside from the others to talk, she asked if I would be there for Jake when he got out. This stopped my heart, she continued saying that he would need me after all this was over. Saying that he needed someone there for him. I of course said that I'd always be there for him.

A few hours later the doctors approached Jake's parents and said that he was awake for medicine if they wanted to see him. I asked if I could see him too, the doctor quickly told me no but Jake's mom convinced him that I had as much right to see him as they did, saying that I was practically a member of their family.

Jake's parents and I headed up to his room, they went if first, only staying for a few minutes so that he could rest. I went in after they left.

I walked in quietly, trying not to disturb him, when I turned the corner and saw him my heart stopped, he laid there in the bed wrapped in bandages and casts and connected to more machines than I've ever seen. He looked like someone on his deathbed, being kept breathing by machines. I expected his face and eyes to light up when he saw me, I expected for him to burst out crying again as I held him. But neither his face nor his eyes lit up when he saw me, they filled with sorrow, regret and sadness.

"Jake?" I asked him, he wasn't saying anything, he was just lying there, motionless. "It's me, can I sit?" I asked, pointing to the seat next to his bed. He just stared at me, not answering me, so I sat.

"Jake." I started as I reached for his hand, but he quickly jerked his hand away. I sat there, upset and confused, he looked like he wasn't happy to see me, he refused to even look me in the eye.

"Jake, what's wrong?" I just looked at him as he stared into space.

"Jake? Are you okay?"

"Three." He whispered, just loud enough for me to hear. I looked at him and it seemed like he didn't know that he had said it out loud.

"Three what?" I asked. His eyes grew slightly wider as he turned to look at me.

"Three more." He said, a little louder.

"Three more what?" I asked him. "Jake, you need to just rest."

He looked at me with sorrow in his eyes. "I killed three more people." He said, his eyes growing cold.

I just stared at him. "I Killed David, Tom and you, I killed three more people." He said this with almost no emotion whatsoever.

"You didn't kill me or Tom, David did, and David' death was not your fault, it was just a reaction, you had no control over your actions."

"Yes it was, I knew what I was doing, I wanted him dead so bad, so I killed him, because he killed Tom, and you…" He trailed off, not finishing his sentence.

"Jake." I started but he interrupted me before I could say another word.

"Do you have any idea how many people I've killed in this war?"

"No." I said, reluctantly. "I try not to keep track."

"Well I do, I've killed thousands, and today I killed three more."

"Jake." I said, trying to take his hand again.

"Don't try to say that I didn't, everyone's deaths are on me. I should have just killed myself and not tried to outsmart David, if I had, then no one else would have gotten killed, like you."

"Jake, it's not your fault."

"Yes it is!" He said as he started raising his voice. "It's all my fault, it's all on me! I killed David, I killed Tom, I _killed_ you!" His voice was shaken. "Jesus, Cassie, I killed you. I killed the one person who I cared for most in this world."

"Jake," I said, trying to sound reassuring. "I'm not dead, remember? The Ellimist brought me back, I'm still here, I'm here with you. You don't need to worry about that anymore. I'm here, I always will be."

"I can't." He said, raising his voice again. "I can't just forget about it, I killed you, I held your dead body in my arms. I just can't forget something like that."

"Jake," I started. "Don't worry, we'll get through this, I'll always be here with you. We are all here for you."

Jake's face grew stoic. "No." He said, emotionless.

"No what?"

"You won't be there anymore."

"What are you saying? I will always be there for you."

"No, I can't do this anymore, I can't lose any of you again."

"What are you saying, Jake?"

"I'm saying that I wouldn't be able to live with myself if something were to happen to you again. Or any of the others for that matter."

"Jake, what are you saying?"

"Cassie I'm leaving the team, I'm quitting the Animorphs. I can't order any of you around anymore. I can't order my friends to their deaths every mission. "

"Jake, don't say that, just give it some time t-"

"No!" He screamed at me. "I've already thought it over. I've always told myself that the day that I let one of you die is the day that I quit. You _died_ because of me, I don't want that to happen ever again."

"Jake, let us at least talk about this, maybe we can-"

"Shut up, Cassie!" He raged at me, my eyes widened. I was in disbelief, he had never said that to me before. "I've made up my mind, I'm done with the team, I'm done with you."

"What does that mean? Done with me?"

"What do you think?" His voice turned harsh.

"Don't give me that, Jake. I've always been there for you, you can't just say something like that." I said as I leaned in towards him, pointing a finger in his face, he seemed startled and angry.

"Get out of my face, Cassie." He warned.

"I can get in your face if I want, you need to hear this, all of this is not your-" At that moment Jake did something that I never in a million years thought he'd do, he backhanded me. Knocking me out of my seat and onto the floor.

"I said get out of my face!" He screamed, loud enough for the whole hospital to hear, I'm sure that they heard the slap as well. For a few seconds I just sat there on the floor, holding my bruised cheek, in shock that he had just hit me.

He just fumed at me until the rage was replaced by shock as he realized what he had done. He looked down at his hand, shaking. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to." He said as he reached his hand out to me, I quickly avoided it and backed away from him. Worried that he'd get mad and hit me again I left without saying a word.

"Cassie!" He cried, tears rolling down his face. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to." As I headed down the hall I could hear the sound of him screaming louder and louder as I could hear the sounds of objects being thrown against the wall.

I turned the corner and was met with the others, they had all heard what had happened, I'm sure, they all watched me as I walked past them and headed for the door.

"Cassie." Rachel called out, running after me. "Stop." I stopped. "What happened in there? We heard him screaming then the sound of things smashing into the wall."

I just stood there as Rachel was looking at my face, I had tried to turn my face so that she wouldn't see the mark on my cheek but it didn't trick her for a second. A look of shock and anger shot across her face as she realized what happened.

"What did he do you to? Are you okay?" She said as she turned my cheek towards her. "Oh my god," She said, anger forming in her voice. "Did he hit you?"

"It's nothing, Rachel, I'm fine." I said as I started to walk away, I didn't get far until Rachel grabbed my arm, stopping me.

"Nothing my ass, Cassie. Tell me, did he hit you, because it sure sounded like he hit you, the entire hospital heard it. Your parents were freaking out."

"It's fine, don't worry about it." I said, trying to break free from Rachel's grip. "I need to go."

"No, not this time." She said, lowering her voice so that on one could hear. "Cassie, just tell me, did he hit you?"

I looked at her, fine, I thought, she has the right to know. I took a deep breath. "He didn't mean to, he was getting flustered and I got in his face, it was my fault. He apologized right after, but I left before I could think, I just left without a word."

"Oh my god, Cassie." Rachel said, pulling me in for a hug, a thing that she almost never does. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine, I'm more shocked than anything."

"What happened in there? What could you guys have been talking about that he got mad enough to hit you? He's never done anything like that before."

Rachel and I sat down on a bench outside for an hour as I told her what happened. Since it was the first chance we had to talk I told her what had happened with Jake's imposter on the phone. Saying that maybe he was right that I couldn't help Jake. Rachel said that it was ridiculous but I wasn't sure. I also told her what had happened with the guy in the woods and what he had tried to do to me. Before I knew it I was crying in front of a bunch of people, but I didn't care, I had had one hell of a day, I didn't care if anyone saw me.

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

It's been a month since David had kidnapped us and killed Tom, and in that time none of us have seen Jake in over two weeks. After Tom's funeral he just seemed to disappear. He stopped going to school and whenever one of us went to his house to see him he either wasn't there, was asleep because he got home at three in the morning or just refused to see us. The rest of us had decided to temporarily stop fighting the Yeerks in order to reflect on what had happened and try to get Jake back. But everyday the idea of Jake just showing up at one of our meetings shrank. We were all worried about him, word around the school was that he had started drinking and doing drugs and that some kids saw him buying drugs on a street corner. We had all hoped that they were just mistaken and that it wasn't Jake or that it was just a rumor, but every day I seemed to believe that it was him more and more.

I had gone to sleep thing about him, like I had been for the past several weeks, not like I used to when I was younger and had a major crush on him and couldn't keep myself from thinking about how soft his lips must be or how he looked without a shirt. Now I mostly worried for him, we had never officially broken up but I knew that he wouldn't be back anytime soon. I had been dreaming about what I would say to him if he were to come back when I suddenly woke up. I sat up in my bed, confused as to why I had just woken up. I looked at my room, no one was there, I looked at my window where Jake normally sat as he waited for me to open the window in falcon morph, no one there. I had this strange feeling that someone was there but I couldn't find who it was. I walked around my house as quiet as I could in order to not wake up my mom, since she had to get up early for a meeting at the Gardens she wouldn't be happy if I woke her up. My dad was out of town for the weekend at a vet conference, which is good news for me since my mom could sleep through anything but my dad woke up from the slightest noise. I walked around downstairs as I looked out the window, I could barely see the barn in the darkness, but I could see a tiny amount of light coming from inside. My first thought was that something had gone wrong with Tobias or Ax and that one of them had gotten hurt. My second thought was that it was Jake, but I pushed that thought away, there was no way that it was him.

I quickly slipped on my shoes and headed to the barn, careful to open the door as quiet as I could, my heart nearly stopped beating, standing on the far side of the small storage room for the medicine was Jake, standing with his back towards me. I just watched him for a few seconds, trying to figure out what he was doing, he was opening all the drawers and going through them. Then it hit me, that's where my dad kept the painkillers for the animals, Jake was stealing medicine from me.

He sifted through the drawers for a while until I guess he found what he was looking for, he held the bottle in his hand and started whispering to himself, but he seemed weird, I couldn't understand what he was saying. He looked at the bottle for a few seconds before putting it back in the drawer as he sighed to himself. He still hadn't noticed that I was there, he continued mumbling to himself.

I walked next to him and stood next to him. "Jake?" I said, trying to sound like I was surprised to see him and had just seen him.

He jerked to the side, startled. "Casie?" He asked, his voice sounding jumbled. "What are you doing here?"

I looked at him, confused. "I live here, Jake, what about you? What are you doing in my barn at two in the morning?"

"I uh, I was,... nothing." He was obviously a little drunk and confused, while I haven't spent a lot of time around drunk people I have seen them enough to know if someone's drunk.

"Jake, tell me, what are you doing?"

He looked a little embarrassed, like a like kid stealing a cookie from the cookie jar. "Look." He said, looking me in my eyes for the first time in a month. "I'm not going to lie to you, I came here to try to find something."

I looked at him confused. "What could you possibly be trying to find in my barn?" I asked, knowing that he was talking about the medicine.

"I was trying to find something to get rid of the pain." He said, his face filled with sorrow.

"Like what?" I asked reluctantly.

"Like you." He said with a smile.

"What do you mean?" I asked a little wearily.

"I'm sorry for how we left things." He said, not answering my question. "I hope you know that I didn't mean to hurt you."

"I know that you didn't. It was my fault, I got in your face when you were mad and warned me not to."

He just stared and smiled at me for a few seconds. "What do you want, Jake? Why are you really here?"

He just kept staring for a few more seconds when he suddenly spoke up. "You're so beautiful." He said, taking a tiny step towards me that I barely noticed.

"What?" I asked, it had completely caught me off guard.

"I said that you're beautiful, you're the most beautiful girl I've ever seen."

"Okay…" I said, trying not to blush. "Why are you telling me this in my barn at two in the morning?"

"Because I love you." He said simply.

I just stared at him. Was he really trying to get back with me at two in the morning in my barn while he was drunk?

"I've loved you since the day I first set my eyes on you. I still love you."

"I love you too, Jake, but why are we talking about this now? I've been trying to talk to you for a month but you refused to talk to me."

"I'm sorry for that, I know that I really hurt you."

"Yeah," I said. "You kinda did."

"I just want to make it up to you some way."

"How?" I asked skeptically?

"I have an idea." He said as he stepped towards me, leaning in as he lightly held my chin. "Like this." He said as he kissed me. At first I tried to pull back but after a few seconds I gave into his kiss. I could taste the huge amount of liquor on his breath as he moved his tongue around in my mouth. For what seemed like hours we just stood there, kissing passionately, stopping just long enough to come up for air.

When he finally pulled away I could feel that my body wanted more. We had very rarely ever kissed like that before.

"Do you forgive me?" He asked, as he wrapped his arms around me. "Because if you don't than I can still make it up to you."

"Jake," I started. "I don't thi-" He broke me off with another even more passionate kiss, after a few seconds I could feel his hands moving from my shoulders down my back. At first I didn't realize what he was doing until he started to lift up my shirt. I had tried to stop his hand but he easily moved my hand to the side and in one quick motion he pulled my shirt over my head and tossed it on the floor.

I quickly pulled away and instinctively covered myself with my hands, I was wearing a bra but Jake had never seen me without my shirt before, it startled me.

He looked at me trying to cover myself and chuckled. "Cassie, what are you doing? It's me, you don't need to cover yourself."

"I know," I said, feeling a little embarrassed, he was my boyfriend and we were both seventeen, there was no reason for me to be shy. "Jake, I don't think that this is a good idea. We shouldn't be doing this right now. I don't know if I want to do this right now."

"Oh come on, Cassie." He said, smiling as he started to pull up his own shirt. "You sure?"

xxxxxxxxxxxx

If you're reading this then thanks for reading until the end. Please review, comment, or message me if you have any thoughts or ideas. I take all constructive criticism.

If you haven't seen it I recently uploaded a one-shot about Marco insulting Jake, to be warned it it rated M for adult language, themes and sexual content. So if you're interested then please go read it and review. It's titled: "Marco's Joke Backfires and Reveals A Secret"


	31. Chapter 31:Cassie: The Night In The Loft

Chapter 31: Cassie: The Night In The Loft

Oh god, I thought as I watched Jake ever so slowly pull of his shirt, seductively almost. I couldn't help but stare, he wasn't Arnold Schwarzenegger muscular but he did have a very nice six-pack. He stood there shirtless, smiling at me.

"See," He said, tossing his shirt on top of mine. "Now we're even."

I smiled as I put my arms down. "We're really not, it's not exactly the same. I've seen you without a shirt before."

"You got that right," He said as he wrapped his arms around me once again, placing his hand on the back of my bra, preparing to take it off. "Here, let's fix that."

"You really want to do this here?" I asked, looking around the small storage room.

"We're where my dad performs surgery on the animals."

He smiled as he briefly kissed me. "We can go inside if you want, I saw that your dad's truck wasn't here."

"That's true but my mom still is, so there's no way we can go in the house, she'd kill you if she found out."

"She doesn't scare me." He said with a smile. "I'm me, I can stare down anyone as a tiger."

I let out a short laugh. "Yeah well, she's stared down the exact same tiger, as herself."

"True." He said, then he smiled again, still holding the back of my bra. "Come on, I have an idea where to go."

"And where's that?" I asked skeptically. "We exactly can't go to each others house."

"You trust me?" He asked, staring into my eyes. God, his eyes were filled with more light than I've seen since we started fighting this war, it's the first time I've seen his eyes alive, it was intoxicating.

I smiled as I wrapped my arms around his neck. "Always."

"Then hang on."

"Hang on?" I asked, but before I could say another word he picked me off my feet and began to carry me through the door to the stairs that connected to the hayloft.

When we reached the top of the stairs he lightly tossed me onto the hay, smiling as he crawled over me and began to kiss me again.

We laid there kissing more passionately than we had ever before for what seemed like hours until he rolled me onto my side and quickly ripped of my bra.

I smiled a little embarrassed as he just stared at my chest, smiling. "Sorry if they're not as big as you thought." I said playfully.

Jake just smiled as he gently placed his hand on my breast, it sent my mind racing. "They're perfect." He said as he grabbed my other one as well. "You're perfect."

We laid there for what seemed like an eternity kissing as we began to remove each others clothing and began to feel each others bodies.

As Jake and I laid together longer he grew more aggressive and forceful, at first I didn't mind, I kind of liked it, but he started to hold my body down harder as he kissed me.

"Jake," I said trying to catch my breath. "Calm down a bit, you're holding me too tight." He just ignored me as he continued to grab my breast, squeezing it over and over.

"Jake," I said louder. "That hurts, stop."

He just continued squeezing my breast, so many thoughts were going through my mind, I was loving the feeling but he was starting to hurt me. Then the memory came back to my mind of the guy named Rico in the woods, Jake didn't know it but he was doing the same exact thing he did, he also had the same look on his face. That face that sent my mind into panic, that face that I saw in my nightmares, the same look that scared me more than anything.

I suddenly pushed Jake away as I without meaning to hit him across the face, just as I tried to hit Rico when he attacked me. I looked at Jake, his drunken eyes were filled with anger, before I could say anything he grabbed my wrists and held me down.

"What the hell?" His face red with anger.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to," I started, trying to free my arms but Jake held me down. "It's just that you were hurting me, it was a reaction."

The anger left his face, good, I thought, I didn't want him mad with me. "Sorry, I didn't mean to hurt you, again."

"It's okay, Jake." I said as I started to get up.

"Where are you going? We're not done, we haven't even done anything yet."

"Well I'm done, Jake. I can't do this anymore." I started to walk away but he grabbed my arm, hard, almost too hard, it hurt.

"Why? What did I do?" He asked angrily.

I turned to look at him. "You didn't do anything, Jake, what you did just reminded me of someone, it scared me."

"Reminded you of someone?" He asked, his voice raising. "Who the hell could I remind you of when we're making out?" I could tell that he was very angry. "What, do I remind you of someone _else_ you made out with?"

I stood there looking at him, shocked.

"Who was it?" He asked, squeezing my wrist harder. "Tell me, who the hell was it?"

"That's not what I meant, Jake. I haven't made out with anyone before, you're the first."

"Then who the hell do I remind you of, why were you scared of me?" I could see the anger starting to disappear from his face.

I looked to him, tears starting to form around my eyes. As he saw this he calmed down. "Cassie, I'm sorry for getting mad, but tell me, what did I do that scared you, who did it?"

"It was one of David's guys." I said, trying not to cry. "When I got captured, one of his guys dropped me in the woods and I demorphed, so did he. He, he tried to rape me, Jake, he grabbed my breasts and squeezed them like you did, he had the same look on his face as you, and when I saw you like that I suddenly thought of him again, thinking that it was him again, not you. I'm sorry."

"Cassie," He said, pulling me in for a hug. "You don't need to apologize, I had no idea, I didn't know what I was doing. Why didn't you tell me that before?"

"I couldn't, you refused to talk to me." I said simply.

"I'm sorry about that," He said. Then he motioned for me to lay back down next to him. "I won't do it again, I swear."

"Sorry Jake, but I don't want to anymore, I can't get him out of my head."

"What do you mean?" His voice started to get a little upset and angry. "Come on, lay back down, I won't do it again."

"I mean that I'm done, Jake. I don't want to do this anymore. I'm sorry, but I can't. You, you should leave, this was a bad idea, we decided that we shouldn't do this for a reason, we all agreed."

His face grew furious. "What do you mean, leave?" He asked, pulling me to him. "We're not done yet."

"Yes, we are. You need to leave, Jake, you're drunk. I don't want you here anymore."

"I'm not drunk." He said angrily. "I'm perfectly fine."

"No, you're drunk. Jake, I can still taste and smell the liquor on your breath."

"Whatever." He said. "But we're not done here, lay back down."

"No Jake." He squeezed my wrist so hard it felt like it was going to snap in two.

"Let go of me, Jake, you're hurting me."

He ignored me as he started to pull me back onto the hay bale.

"Jake!" I yelled at him. I hoped to god that my mom hadn't somehow heard me and came to see what was going on. "Stop. You're hurting me. You need to leave."

"I'm not going anywhere." He said, and in one hard yank he pulled me back onto the hay bale. Continuing to kiss me.

"Jake!" I yelled as I broke away from him. "Stop, I told you no."

"You don't mean that, Cassie, you know it."

"No, I do mean it, I want you to let me go."

Jake flipped me onto my back as he held my wrists, holding me down. I tried to push him off but he was much larger and stronger than me, there was no way I'd be able to make him get off me. My mind jumped back to the guy in the woods, thinking that it was happening all over again, and this time no one was here to save me.

Jake stopped kissing me briefly as he started to put himself inside me for the first time. My mind seemed to explode, so many feelings were going on inside my head all at once. It felt so amazing, but also terrifying at the same time. A part of my mind wanted to stop struggling and to let myself give in to the feeling but the other wanted to get away from Jake because he was forcing me to do this, I had told him to stop.

I laid there for awhile, my mind racing, trying to decide what to do, to let go and do this with Jake or to make him stop. I knew that he was drunk, but he'd never hurt me, we both knew deep down that we've wanted to do this for months now, but I didn't know.

After a minute I stopped trying to fight him, giving in to what was happening. I knew that I wanted to be with him as well, so I just stopped trying to push him off me and let myself enjoy what was happening.


	32. Chapter 32: Jake: These Hands

Chapter 32: Jake: These Hands

I woke up, my eyes still closed, my head groggy and pounding worse than it ever had before. I knew that I drank before going to bed last night but this was something else. I rolled over to where my nightstand normally was where I kept my headache meds but as I did I felt a body next to me, a warm, seemingly naked body. Still confused and hungover I opened my eyes, when I did this I nearly jumped up. Lying next to me was Cassie, completely naked, with sweat and I could only guess what rolling down her body.

Please don't let that be what I think it is, I thought to myself, standing up as carefully as I could in order to not wake her up. I looked around me, still confused, I was in the hayloft in her barn, but I didn't remember coming here, and I definitely didn't remember sleeping with her. I'm pretty sure that I would if we did sleep together but there's really no other reason why we'd be lying next to each other naked, so we must have slept together. I looked at her as she slept, she looked so peaceful, trying to decide whether not I should wake her up, the sun was already coming up, she needed to get up for school. School. I thought, I hadn't been there in weeks, too much there to remind me of Tom and Cassie, that's why I didn't go. I bent over to shake her awake when my eye caught something that brought back memories of the night before, red marks on her wrists. I looked at them, I could see that they were bruised, bruised from me holding her down, holding her down, forcing her to have sex with me as she told me no. I staggered back, feeling like I had just been hit by a truck. I had forced her to sleep with me, she tried to make me stop but I didn't. Then the realization hit me, I had raped her, she told me to stop and I didn't, that was rape. I quickly pulled my hand away from her, grabbed my pants, underwear and shoes, I couldn't find my jacket hoodie that I wore last night, but it didn't matter, I had to get out of there. Before I left I passed by the medicine table and grabbed a couple of bottles of the painkillers that I had seen last night and stuffed them in my pockets, as I ran out of her barn and away from her.

Xxxxx

On the way home the memories of last night returned. I remembered everything that happened, everything that she said. How she told me of what that guy tried to do to her, and how I reminded her of him. He had tried to rape her but I'm the one that actually did. I felt like a monster. On my way home I popped a few of the painkillers, careful as to not take too many and knock myself out before I got home. I got a few strange looks from people driving to work because I was walking down the street without a shirt, some guy in a suit at the bus stop asked if I needed money for clothes, I told him that I left my shirt at someone's house, he looked at me for a seconds before smiling and saying that he knew how that was, sometimes you just gotta get out of there as fast as possible. He had no idea. Before I went any further I stopped by an abandoned house where we all stashed some extra street clothes, I quickly grabbed another shirt and headed home.

I got home as my parents were leaving for work. Before now I would have been grounded until I was eighteen if they caught me doing this but for the last couple weeks they hadn't cared when I got home. I never said more than a word or so. I didn't want to in fear of telling them what actually happened and guilt that they would blame me for Tom's death. I walked past them, saying nothing. From the look in my dad's eye I could tell that he knew I was hungover, but that wasn't a shock for him anymore, I showed up drunk or hungover almost everyday now.

"Jake, honey," My mom said as she walked up to me. "Are you okay? Where were you last night? We were worried."

I said nothing as I walked past her and headed towards the kitchen to grab some food before I went upstairs to sleep off the hangover.

I quickly ate the leftover pizza from last night and chugged down a bottle of water as I listened to my parents talk outside.

"We need to do something about him," My mom said, worry in her voice. "He just came home hungover, and we didn't do anything about it."

"I know how you feel, dear," My dad said. "But I don't think that there's anything that we can do. We already tried talking to him and getting him a therapist but he refused to talk to him so he quit. Jake blames himself for Tom's death, along with that boy who attacked them, I can't even begin to imagine what's going on inside his head right now. You've heard him, he's woken up every night for the last few weeks screaming that he killed them."

"I know." My mom said. "But I still think that we need to try to help him."

Help? I thought, I don't _need_ any help. What I _need_ is for Tom to come back to me.

My parents left after a few minutes, still worried about me. I just sat on my bed trying to not explode from everything that had happened. I looked down to my hands, I had held her down with these hands. I had forced her to have sex with me with these hands. I had raped her with these hands. Furious with myself I started grabbing everything around and throwing them against the wall, screaming.

After I calmed down I looked around my room, I had completely trashed it, my desk was flipped over and beer and water bottles had let several dents in the wall. I walked over to my mini fridge, grabbed a new can of beer, chugged it and took some more painkillers before passing out on my bed, empty can in my hand.


	33. Chapter 33: Cassie: The Morning After

Chapter 33: Cassie: The Morning After

I suddenly woke up, my mind fuzzy. I looked around me to see that I was in the hayloft.

"Ugh, my head. Jake?" I asked aloud. "Jake, you awake?" I looked next to me to find that he wasn't there. Had he seriously left without saying anything? He didn't even bother to wake me up. I quickly grabbed my clothes and looked out the barn door, my mom's car was gone, good, I thought. I don't need her to know what happened last night. I glanced at the clock on the wall, I silently cursed myself under my breath. I was late for school, it started over an hour ago. My math teacher is gonna kill me, we have a huge test today that I'm going to miss by the time I get there. On the other side of the room I saw Jake's hoodie that he wore last night, why did he leave it? I asked myself. I picked it up and held it up. Jake, I thought, what did we do? My mind was all jumbled with everything that had happened. Jake and I slept together, when he was drunk and after we had kind of broken up, jeez, what am I supposed to do? Should I try calling him? Should I go over and talk to him? I thought about it for awhile but I eventually decided that I should give him some space, he probably feels terrible about being drunk and all.

I went inside and took a long shower, trying to wash all the sweat and everything off my body. I sat in the tub for a half an hour thinking about Jake and what he did. I didn't know how to feel, I know that I told him no but I wanted to and he was drunk, so was it really his fault? I know that he'd never do that normally, he only acted like that because he was drunk.

I looked down to my wrists to see that they were red and bruised. Perfect, I thought, don't these look suspicious. I got out of the shower and looked at myself in the mirror, when I did I nearly jumped up and screamed. My entire neck and chest were covered in very noticeable, very large hickies. "Even more perfect," I said aloud to myself. There's no way anyone would not guess what these were, if my mom saw these when she got home she'd kill me, then most likely Jake as well. I could always morph and they'd be gone like that but I had this uneasy feeling about it. Like something in the back of my mind was telling me not to morph. I also wasn't feeling so well so I decided not to morph.

I got dressed, trying to find something that would cover my neck. I didn't own a scarf and my coat would be too bulky and hot to wear all day. Then from the corner of my eye I saw Jake's hoodie hanging off the side of my bed where I left it. I quickly threw it on and walked back to the mirror. It was way too big on me, Jake was much larger than me, I only came up to his chin. The sleeves were too long for my arms to fit through them and it went halfway down to my knees, but since it was so large it did cover my neck pretty well. As long as I kept an eye on it and didn't move too much nobody should be able to see them.

***(Later that Morning)***

I got to school just before lunch, great, I missed half the day. Hopefully the school won't call my mom since I missed so many classes. I walked through the front door right past a security guard, luckily it was lunch time and kids were going and leaving, so no one noticed me coming in late. I hurried to the cafeteria and sneaked to the back of the room trying to avoid being noticed by anyone I knew. I didn't want anyone asking why I was covering my neck and wrists, especially Rachel, she'd totally flip if she heard that I slept with Jake last night. She might actually try to kill him, she told me once that if Jake ever laid a single finger on me she'd shove his head so far up his, you know. Plus, I didn't even know how I felt about what happened enough to know how I'd tell someone about it.

I sat in the back of the room trying to not look suspicious, but that was completely impossible, every teacher and student looked at me confused as they walked by. Which I understand, because I definitely looked strange, I had my arms folded and my hands in my sleeves as I had my hood and collar propped up on my neck so no one could see the hickies and figure out what they were.

I was pushing the food around on my tray when guess who notices me from the other side of the room and calls to me, Rachel. That's who. My disguise didn't fool her for a second. She walked over to me, the whole time her eyes studied me, trying to figure out why I looked the way I did.

"Cassie?" She asked as she sat across from me. "What are you doing? You look like a druggy, hiding in your hoodie and glancing around like that."

"I just don't feel good, I'm probably getting sick." I said lamely, trying to come up with an excuse quickly.

"Well you look weird, even more than usual I mean." She said with a smile.

"What's up with the hoodie? Isn't that Jake's, why are you wearing it?"

My eyes widened, of course she recognized his hoodie. "It was the only one I had."

"Oh," She said, seeming to believe me, I mean it was true that it was the only one I had but hopefully she didn't ask anything else about it. "Did he let you borrow it? Did you see him today?"

Of course she'd ask that, I thought. "No." I said, trying to sound calm as my mind was freaking out, hoping that she wouldn't hear my heart pounding. "He left it at my house the last time he was there. I haven't seen him in weeks." I hated lying to Rachel like this but I had no choice.

"So why are you wearing it then? I know that it's cute and all for girls to wear their boyfriend's hoodies but you told me that he dumped you in the hospital, isn't that right?"

"He did, but I still thi-" Rachel cut me off.

"That idiot doesn't know what he's doing, first he quits the team then he dumps you, I can't believe that. After all the time it took him to grow the balls to tell you how he felt and now he broke up with you. I don't get guys sometimes."

"Yeah, but I still thi-" Rachel cut me off again.

"Cassie, I just don't want him to hurt you again if he never comes back. I mean, I'd be as happy as anyone if he came back but it's been _two_ months, and he hasn't done a single thing to try and come back to us. I know that he took Tom's death hard, I mean, he's my cousin, my mom still cries about him whenever she sees something that reminds her of him, but Jake is taking it too personally. It wasn't his fault, he should know that. Look Cassie," She said as she lowered her voice. "I just don't think that you should waste your life waiting for him to come back, because it's very likely that he never will. And besides, if he ever does come back you know as well as I do that he won't be the same. I heard from his parents that he's started drinking, like almost religiously. They can't get him to stop." She paused for a second before starting again.

"You know what I mean, right? You're my best friend, and I don't want to see you hurt by him again. Both emotionally and physically, he freaking backhanded you at the hospital because he lost it for a second. Can you even imagine what he could do if he really lost it, I mean for real? He could snap and end of morphing tiger, if that were to happen he wouldn't stop at just hitting you, he could literally _kill_ you, Cassie. If he were to ever hurt you I'd take him down myself, you know that, right?"

"Gee, thanks, Rachel." I said sarcastically. "You really know how to make me feel better."

Rachel didn't look happy. "I'm being serious here, Cassie. Jake might be my cousin and my so-called leader but if he ever loses it and hurts you again, I'll take him down, hard."

I was trying to act all calm and collected in front of Rachel but I was a ball of nerves. Without thinking about it I kept rubbing my wrists over and over as we talked, and of course Rachel noticed right away.

In the blink of an eye Rachel grabbed my wrist and brought it to her face. "What the hell is up with your wrist?" Then her eyes grew to cover her face. "Is that a bruise? Did someone bruise your wrist? Who the hell hurt you?"

"It was nobody, Rachel." I said as I pulled my wrist back. I was panicking trying to come up with a good excuse. "It was just one of our horses, I was brushing it this morning and it pressed my wrist against the stall with it's body. Don't worry about it, I'm fine." Now I know that my excuse was lame but it was all I could think of, and it might actually work because that had happened before.

Rachel looked at me, I could tell that she was skeptical but she didn't know what I was hiding yet. "Whatever you say, Cassie."

"I'm not lying, Rachel, that's what happened."

"Sure it is, then you shouldn't mind showing me your other wrist, would you?" Rachel looked at me, she knew that I was lying and that she had me. There was no point in lying, she knew it.

"Fine." I said as I showed her my other wrist. "Here, look, you happy now?"

Rachel inspected my wrist, clearly not happy that I had lied to her. Then her face grew red. "Cassie." She started with a low voice. "I'm not stupid, I can see that these were made from someone's hands. Tell me, Cassie, tell me who hurt you."

"No one hurt me, I'm fine." I said as I rubbed my neck and accidentally showed her my neck.

"What the hell?" She nearly yelled and jumped out of her seat, several students and teachers looked over to what was going on. "Are you fucking kidding me, Cassie? Are those really hick-" Before she could say another word I cut her off.

"Please, Rachel, at least try to keep your voice down, the whole school doesn't need to know."

"So you mean that they are actually," She stopped herself and lowered her voice. "They're actually hickies?" Her voice a mixture of shock and anger.

I looked at her, head in my hands. "Yeah, they are." I said reluctantly.

"Then those bruises on your wrists are from,..." Her eyes widened and the anger on her face was replaced by shock.

I silently nodded my head.

"Oh my god." Her face lighting up. "It's about time, Cassie, you know that. Good for you."

It was my turn to be shocked. "About time?" I asked. "You mean that you're happy about this?"

"Of course, you are my best friend after all. What, how did you think I'd react?"

"I, uh, thought you'd be furious." I said sheepishly. "I'd thought you'd try to kill him, honestly."

"Furious? Try to kill him? Why would I do that? Wait," She paused and stared at me. I was worried that she suspected that it was Jake. "Don't tell me," She paused again. This was killing me. "It wasn't Marco was it? Because if it was I really will kill him."

I was shocked, did she really not suspect Jake? It's true that we did break up and that we hadn't seen each other for a few weeks before last night but who else would it be?

Rachel looked at me, questioningly. "It wasn't Marco, right?" I could hear the worry in her voice.

"Of course not." I said quickly. I heard Rachel breath a sigh of relief.

"Good. Okay then. Here's the million dollar question, who was it? Was it that cute guy from science class that sits behind us? Because I knew that he kept staring at you, but you didn't believe me. So tell me, was it him?"

"You mean Brian?" I asked, confused.

"Of course I mean Brian, what other cute guys sit behind us? So was it him?"

I looked down, trying to decide how much I should tell her, she's my best friend and I hate lying to her like this but I'm really worried about what she'd say and do if I told her that it was Jake.

"Oh come on, Cassie, you gotta tell me." Rachel kept pressing for information. "Okay then, do I know this guy?"

"Yeah, you do." I said reluctantly.

"Is he cute?" She asked as she stared at me, as if this conversation was the most interesting thing ever.

"Rachel-" I started but she quickly cut me off.

"Come on, Cassie, just tell me, what's the problem? Do you not trust me or something?"

"It's not that, Rachel."

"Then what is it?" She asked.

"It's just that I don't know how you'd react when you heard who it was."

"What does that mean? Is this guy like twentyfive or something?" The smile left her face. "He better not be."

"He's seventeen, like us."

"Okay, but just tell me who it was already."

Rachel studied my every movement, she knew that I didn't want to talk about this and that I was nervous about it. I was still considering whether or not I should tell her or not when her eyes widened to cover her face and her mouth dropped open.

"Don't tell me, Cassie." She paused and leaned in. "It was Jake, wasn't it?"

Without thinking I answered her. "How'd you know?" I asked, then when I realized that I had just said that I covered my mouth.

"Are you serious, Cassie? What were you thinking?" Rachel's voice rose and more heads turned around.

I grabbed her hand and pulled her hand and pulled her outside and away from curious ears. "Can you please try to keep it down, Rachel?"

"Are you kidding me?" Her voice rose. "That's what you're worried about? Shouldn't you be worried about the fact that you just slept with Jake?"

"What?" I asked. "Weren't you just the one who said that she was happy for me and asked why you'd be mad?"

"Well that was before I knew that it was Jake. Cassie, what were you thinking? We haven't seen him in over two weeks and he breaks up with you before he backhands you, and you go and sleep with him?"

"Well I didn't plan to, it just sorta happened."

"So it was his idea then, and you just went along with it, after everything he's done to you?"

"I don't think he planned it either, I told you, it just sorta happened."

"What do you mean, it just sorta happened?"

"I mean that he was drunk, he didn't mean to-" I quickly shut my mouth, I didn't mean to say that he was drunk.

"He was what?" Rachel was almost yelling now. "And you just let a drunk Jake into your bed without a second thought?"

"I didn't let him into my bed exactly, I mean, my mom was home so we couldn't do it there."

"So where did you do it, the freaking forest?"

"No, it was in my barn, the hayloft."

"Are you serious?" Rachel asked, massaging her forehead with her hand. "The hayloft?"

"Yeah, I am."

"What happened? Tell me everything."

Rachel slowly began to calm down as I told her how Jake just showed up drunk and how we talked a bit and how we finally slept together, I left out the parts about how he held me down for a bit and chose my words carefully when I told her that he reminded me of that guy in the woods.

After I finished telling Rachel what happened we hurried to class and somehow I got through the rest of the day.


	34. Cassie: The Words Of A Loved One

Chapter 34: Cassie: The Words Of A Loved One

I should have realized it sooner, when I first started waking up those first few days nauseous, having to rush to the bathroom to throw up. I should have put two and two together. Maybe I was just being paranoid, I thought, or maybe I was just refusing to let myself think that it was true. Now after the second week of waking up nauseous and throwing up I was sitting in my bathroom at home, with a box of pregnancy tests.

I ended up going through half the box before I finally let in and admitted to myself that I was pregnant.

It has been a little over a month since Jake and I had slept together. He hadn't talked to me since, not that I hadn't tried. For the first two weeks after I called him everyday, he never even picked up. I even tried to go talk to him in person, but he always refused to talk to me.

"Oh god, why is this happening to me? Why now of all times?" I asked aloud to my bathroom. The realization had finally set in, I just stared at the small test strip in my hand in awe. I was pregnant, I was seventeen and pregnant, I was fighting a secret war for Earth and I was pregnant.

How in the world would I explain this to my parents? Knowing my mom I won't be able to hide it for much longer, she'll figure it out as soon as I let anything slip. How would I tell the others? Rachel knew that Jake and I had slept together and she was not exactly happy about it, she's still upset with him for acting like this. How would I tell Jake, he's already going through so much right now, he's definitely not in a place to be raising a kid, he's depressed and quickly becoming an alcoholic. There's no way that he'd take this news well, if he even lets me talk to him to tell him, that is.

He has the right to know at least, I thought. I need to tell him, maybe if I tell him this then it'll be able to help shake him from this funk. While me being pregnant right now and under these circumstances is not a good thing, he's going to be a father, we're going to be parents. Maybe if I explain to him that I and his child need him it'll help him in some way.

"Cassie? You've been in there for a half an hour, are you okay?" It was my mom standing outside the door. Great, I was not ready for her to find out that I was pregnant yet, I think that I should tell Jake first.

"I'm okay, mom." I answered back a little too quickly. "I just think I have a stomach bug or something, I'm not feeling too well. Probably ate something bad at the mall with Rachel." I had somehow been able to hide the fact that I've thrown up nearly every morning for the past two weeks from my mom. "I'll be out in a sec."

"If you're not feeling well then I can take you to the doctor for a check up tomorrow since it's Saturday, I'll make you an appointment." I could hear her turning and beginning to walk down the hall to the phone.

"No, no, wait. I mean, I'm fine." The last thing I need now is to go to the doctor and have them tell my mom I'm pregnant before I have the chance to tell her. "Don't worry about it, I'm fine. It's probably just one of those twentyfour-hour bugs. I'll live."

"If you're sure that you'll be okay, just make sure that you get some rest tonight."

"I will, mom, and besides, I was going to see Jake tomorrow, try to cheer him up, you know."

"How is he doing?" I could hear the worry in her voice. "Last I heard he refused to talk to anyone."

"That's true, but I have an idea to get him out of his funk, I think that I might be the only one who can reach him, I have to try. I have something I need to tell him."

"That's good for you, honey. He needs someone there for him, even if he doesn't think that he does. Is it good news? I hope it is, he really needs something good in his life right now. What do you need to tell him?"

My eyes widened, like a deer in the headlights. It's a good thing that I was behind the door so that my mom didn't see my reaction.

"It's nothing too big," I lied. "I'll tell you after I see him tomorrow, see what you have to say about it."

"Cassie?" She asked.

"Yes?" I asked reluctantly.

"Is there something that happened between you and Jake? I ask this because you two have never had this problem before, it seems like he's trying to get rid of you. Did something happen?"

"Sorta," I said, trying to make sure that I didn't reveal anything yet. "At the hospital we kind of got in an argument, he said and did some things that he regrets, he's ashamed of himself in a way, that's why he doesn't want to talk to me."

"Well what did he say, hopefully it wasn't anything too bad. What did he do?"

"He uh, he lost his temper for a second and yelled at me."

"We all heard the yelling, Cassie, the whole hospital did. We also heard, something else." I could hear the concern in her voice. "Now, I had decided not to say anything about it because I thought that what was said between you two was your business, and that you were okay, but tell me, did he hit you? We all heard the sound of a slap."

"Yeah," I said reluctantly. "He did. He backhanded me."

"Honey, you should've told us. What happened between you two for him to hit you? We've known Jake for years, and he's never done anything like that before, he has never hurt you before."

"I know, mom, I should've told you, I just didn't want Jake to get in trouble. He had already gone through so much that day. It wasn't his fault, he was already getting upset and I got in his face about it, he, he warned me to get out of his face, but I gave him attitude back, he lost it for a second and hit me. He of course tried to apologize right after but I left before he had the chance."

"Oh honey," My mom said as I opened the door. As soon as I did she rushed to hug me. "I'm so sorry, I hope you know that he didn't mean to, you know that Jake would never hurt you."

"I know, mom."

My mom and I hugged for a bit until she finally let me go so that I could go to school. I headed out the door to the bus. I spent the entire day at school worrying and thinking about how I would tell Jake that I was pregnant. I would be lying if I said that I wasn't terrified beyond belief, I was so nervous about how he'd react, he's not exactly in the best state right now.

The day finally ended and I found myself heading over to Jake's house, somehow going to tell him the biggest news of our lives.

Xxxxx

I arrived at Jake's house more nervous than I've ever been. I hadn't been here in a few weeks, but it feels like much longer than that. Walking up to his door I mustered all the courage I had and knocked. After half a minute Jake's mom Jean answered, she looked a little shaken as she opened the door until she saw that it was me and her face lit up.

"Cassie," She said excitedly as she hugged me. "How are you? Are you here to talk to Jake?"

"I'm doing alright, Jean, life's been pretty crazy lately." I said as I returned the hug. "And yeah, I'm here to talk to Jake, there's something important that I need to tell him, is he here?"

She let go of me and had a concerned look on her face. "He's uh, here, physically at least, but his mind isn't, he doesn't talk anymore, he never does anything but eat, sleep and leave. Unfortunately he's asleep as far as I know, he stumbled in drunk off his mind at four this morning, he woke up the whole neighborhood, screaming at Homer like a madman."

She stopped for a few seconds as she gestured me in the door. "He doesn't let me or his father in his room, or anyone for that matter, but go ahead and go on in there, just knock before going in, you don't want to startle him when he's like this, believe me."

When she said this I began to think about how hard all of this must be on her and her husband. Their eldest son was killed at random, or so they believe, and their youngest son killed his killer and has in return died inside. Jake has never been one to talk about his emotions, it's like pulling teeth with him, but whenever he has a major problem he always talked to me, but now some of his problems are with me, so he won't talk to me about them.

I started heading for the stairs but Jean stopped me.

"Cassie, wait." I turned around to see her in tears.

"What's wrong, Jean?"

"Thank you, Cassie. Thank you."

"For what?" I asked, stepping back to her.

"For being there for Jake. For loving him. For…" She paused as she wiped the tears from her eyes. "For not giving up on him, his father and I, we…, couldn't do anything for him, we gave up on him." She started crying more and more. "We gave up on our son." I could hear the emotion in her voice, her guilt with herself for giving up on helping their son.

"Don't say that," I said as I hugged her again. "You didn't give up, you've done so much for him, he, he just can't be reached right now, but that's not your fault. It's not. That's why I need to talk to him, I need to show him that things can and will get better, and that there are always people there for him."

"Thank you Cassie, thank you so much. You have always been here for him, always. What did he ever do to deserve someone like you?"

Jake's mom let me go after a while and wished me luck talking to Jake. Walking up the stairs I felt all my nerves and worries disappear.

Xxxxx

I reached Jake's door and knocked with all the confidence I had. At first there was silence before I heard the sound of shuffling and groaning, I really had waken him up. From behind the door I heard a jumble of words and cursing.

"Jake, it's me, I'm coming in. We need to talk." I said boldly, I wanted him to know that I was being serious, he was not going to push me away today.

"Cassie?" His voice was a mix of surprise, guilt and sadness. "Hold on, don't come in, hold on." I heard the sound of bottles clanking and closet doors closing as he moved things.

After a few seconds the sounds stopped and the door opened.

"Cassie," He said, his eyes red, face pale and body shaking. "What are you doing here, I told you that I didn't want to see you anymore."

I examined him, he looked terrible, he had lost a lot of weight, he had never been overweight, just muscular and big, so it was an unhealthy amount of weight. His eyes were red and glazed over, most likely from some kind of drugs. His skin tone was paler than normal, he looked really sick, like he was deprived from sunlight. He wasn't happy to see me, that part was obvious enough, but I stood my ground and looked him in the eye.

"Yeah, well, there's something that I need to tell you, and you're going to listen, we need to talk, you owe me that much."

Now, saying that he was shocked would be an understatement, he just stood there, eyes wide, mouth open, surprised.

"Okay then, come on in." He said as he gestured me in the door.

Walking in my eyes scanned his room, I had been in here before, many times, for years actually, but I had never seen it like this. His desk was slammed against the wall, with one of the legs broken. His bed was a mess, covered with a dozen beer and alcohol bottles, candy wrappers and various bags of chips and snacks. I looked at the far wall, there were several holes and dents in it from objects being thrown at it. His window was covered by a very large black sheet, making the room very dark, also making it impossible for a hawk or osprey to look in.

I stopped in the middle of his room and waited as he slowly closed the door and walked past me to his desk, turning on his lamp. As he walked past me he stayed as far away from me as he could, almost bumping into his dresser.

"Can I sit?" I asked as I pointed to his bed next to me, gesturing at the jumble of bottles and bags.

"Oh, yeah." He said as he rushed over and cleared a spot for me to sit. "Sorry."

"It's not a problem, Jake. Here," I said as I patted next to me on the bed. "You're gonna wanna sit for this, believe me." I smiled to try to reassure him as he stood there. I knew that he wouldn't sit next to me but it was worth a shot.

He said nothing as he walked over to his desk, picked the cair off the floor and sat in it facing me.

I looked at him expecting for him to say something, but he never did. So I started talking.

"Jake I'm here to talk with you, so I'd really appreciate if you'd talk to me."

"Then what do you want to talk about?"

"I'm here to tell you, rather explicitly. That you need to get out of this funk of yours."

"Cassie, I sa-" He started but I quickly cut him off holding up my hand.

"Let me finish, Jake. Look, I've tried being nice, I've tried talking to you and being there for you but you've refused to listen. It's been almost _four_ months since David captured us, since Tom and I died, Jake, it's time to let yourself grieve and accept that Tom's death was not your fault, nor mine for that matter. Jake, what happened was not your fault, none of us blame you, not Rachel, Marco, Tobias, Ax or I. Jake, you need to know that while you think that you killed me back there in that factory, you didn't, but you're killing me now. How you're acting is hurting me, Jake. You think that by keeping me out of your life is protecting me from getting hurt by you again but it's not, you're hurting me more now than you ever have. More from me dying by the hands of David to when you hit me in the hospital to when you held me down drunk, Jake, what you're doing now is destroying all the hope and love that I feel for you. I will always love you but if you refuse to show me that you love me back then I will leave. I won't always sit here and wait for you to come back, I know that you've gone through so much in this war but you need to know that we all have, and that we are all here for each other. Jake, the team needs you, I need you. We haven't attacked the Yeerks since David, Visser Three is growing bolder, he thinks that we either died or that the Andalite's gave up on Earth. We need our Fearless Leader again, we need you, Jake. We need you to help us fight the Yeerks again before they set up their new Kandrona next month. Jake, we need you."

"You don't need me, I'm no leader. What you guys needs is to elect a new leader. Try Tobias, he's sensible, strong headed and is cool under pressure."

"You're wrong, Jake, we need you again. You were a valuable part of our team, you just can't be replaced."

Jake sat silently as he stared at the wall. We had had this conversation many times before.

"Look, Jake." I started again after a few seconds of silence. "We can argue about that all we want but if you don't change there's no point in it. I didn't come here to argue with you anyway."

"Then why are you here?" He asked a little harshly.

"I'm here to tell you something, that something wonderful has happened, to try to help you feel like there is a reason to live again. A reason to hope and to love."

"And what's that?" He asked rather skeptically.

I looked at him in the eyes and took a deep breath as I mustered all my courage.

"Jake, I'm pregnant. You're going to be a father."

Jake's eyes widened and jaw dropped as he quickly stood up and started yelling.

"Are you serious, Cassie?"

I nodded my head yes.

"Fuck!" He yelled, grabbing his chair by it's back and pounding it against the floor. "Oh god. What did I do? God, why? Holy shit. Cassie, I'm so sorry."

"Jake, you don't need to apologize, it's fi-" I started as I stood up but he quickly cut me off.

"No, it's not, Cassie. What I did to you is not fine. I raped you."

My eyes widened as he finished. "Rape? Jake you didn't rape me, I went along with it, you just startled me at first is all. I'm fine with what happened, you were drunk, you couldn't control yourself."

"Whatever, doesn't matter what you think. Besides, concerning the kid, it's not mine. It's not my kid and I'm not it's father."

"What are you talking about, Jake? Of course you're our kid's father."

"Let's get one thing straight, Cassie, there is no 'our', we are not a couple, and that kid is not mine. I cannot take care of a kid after all I've done. How could we raise a kid knowing that it's dad is a murderer. I'm sorry Cassie, but I can not be your child's father."

"Jake, please." I started as I started crying as I stepped forward to hug him. He quickly backed away. "Please, Jake. I need you, now more than ever. I know that you're going through so much right now but the baby won't be here tomorrow, we have eight months before the baby gets here. That's eight months to help you deal with everything you're going through. Jake, if you're willing to work with me through this before our baby gets here then I'm willing to help you. But I have to be certain that you are actually wanting to get better in order to help you. If you refuse to change then I will leave and you will never see me or my child again, do you understand me?"

Jake stared at me with stoic eyes, unwavering, emotionless. "I understand, Cassie. If I don't want to lose you then I need to change. I understand." He gave a brief, timid smile. "For you, anything. I'll try to get my act together before the baby comes. I don't want to lose you forever if I don't."

"Oh, Jake." I whispered as I tried to hug him again, this time he let me. I can't tell you how it felt to be held in his arms again. His strong, caring, encouraging, loving arms again. He held me for a few minutes as he quietly cried, Jake's never been much of a crier, so it shocked me a little to see how much he was crying. But with how much he's gone through in the past several months I can imagine why.

After a few more minutes he let go of me and I slumped back onto his bed. He walked over to his mini fridge and opened it, as he did I could see various kinds of beer and liquor that I've never even heard of.

"Do you want something to drink?" He asked me as he buried his head in his fridge looking for something.

My eyes widened in surprise. "Jake, are you serious?"

"Uh, yeah, I am. Why?" He answered back, his head still buried in the fridge.

"Jake, I just told you that I'm pregnant, I can't drink any alcohol, and I don't drink anyway, you know that." I said this with a surprised, almost in shock kind of tone. Had he really just offered me a drink after I just told him that I was pregnant?

Jake slowly pulled his head from the fridge, his back to me. "I meant water, Cassie." He said as he turned around and held out a water bottle. "I'm not stupid, Cassie. I may be hungover but I'm not an idiot. I know that you can't and don't drink."

I grabbed the bottle from his hand with a sheepish smile. Kind of embarrassed that I misunderstanded him and thought that he didn't know. "Sorry." I said before taking a sip. "I know that you know that I can't drink."

Jake sat next to me as he opened a bottle of beer. I looked at him. "What?" He asked. "Just because you can't drink doesn't mean I can't. And besides, I already had the bottle."

"Jake," I said as I gave him a disappointed look. "I thought that you just said that you would change and stop doing this. Why do you feel like you need to drink?"

He stopped drinking and smiled at me. "This," He said as he pointed to my stomach. "This is why I'm drinking."

I gave him another look and he stopped drinking. "Okay," He said, sounding rather defeated. "This is the last one, I promise."

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Author's Note: Thank you all for reading my first ever fanfic. I started this when I was a freshman in highschool, I'm graduated now, so it's been a long time coming but this story is finished. But no need to worry, for this story is not over, as you read this I am planning a second book to this story. It will take place a few months after this one. I plan on uploading the first few chapters of book 2 on New Year's Eve. But if you guys show me that you really like what I'm doing I'll release the first few chapters sooner. In the meantime I should be posting a new story every Friday/Saturday, (depending on how late I upload it). Next week, December 2nd, I will be uploading a revised/edited version of this story. In order to fix some typos and to play around with some wordings, also in order to try to lengthen some of the shorter chapters.

I will be trying to keep a very strict schedule and upload a new one-shot every friday until New Year's Eve when I upload the second book. If you guys again comment, favorite or PM me telling me that you like my stuff then I'll maybe be able to upload more than one short one-shot a week, but you have to ask.

{[(!SPOILER WARNING!)]}

So I bet that you're all wondering about what my next book will be about and how it will be written, if I'll have shorter or longer chapters and everything. Well I'm not going to give away the plot or major spoilers but my next book will have the Yeerks stop their secret invasion and attempt to conquer Earth outright in one final move. Jake is still depressed and having problems as the team picks a new leader as Cassie is still pregnant and gets ready to give birth. The Animorphs must reveal themselves to the world in order to warn the people of Earth, which entails heading to Washington and getting the backing of the US government in order to stop the Yeerks…

Next Book; Animorphs: The Untold Stories #2 "Mr. President, We Need To Talk" should be releasing on New Year's Eve, but check my future uploads for changes in my schedule.

I just want to thank you all again for reading this story. When I first started on here last month I never imagined that I would have over 600 views already on this story, and have people in 13 countries reading my work. I've had a few people in Switzerland and Malaysia and even someone in Poland. (If you're that guy from Poland here's a shout out to you. Leave a comment or message me. Or in fact wherever you're from leave a comment.)

If you guys have any questions, comments, concerns or ideas on my story then I'd love to hear it. If any of you out there need someone to proofread something or give feedback on a story then let me know, I'd be happy to help. However I ask that you only send me Animorphs stories to read, as I have gotten a non-Animorphs story to proofread and had no idea about the books it was based on.

So anyway, enough of my babbling, it's 3:30am and I need to get to bed. Thanks again for all of you who have read my two stories and who are still reading this. If you're still reading this then leave a comment, I'd love to know if anyone reads these.

Check my profile and stuff for future one-shots in the next few weeks. Some may be rated M by the way.

Thanks for all the support, until next week, always keep creating.

HephaestusBuilds

P.S. Check me out on MuseScore if you like that kind of stuff. I'l upload new stuff on there eventually, or whenever I pay for a full account.


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